A long time ago two fillies were born. One gifted unicorn who could move the moon. An earth pony who could impossibly move sunbeams. These fillies are Celestial Light and Lunar Sun.
Celestia and Luna's past was never very certain. At least not until Luna decided to tell the story of an ancient village with a filly who could move the moon and her older sister who could lift sun beams. This is the story of earth pony Celestial Light and unicorn Lunar Sun.
A long, and I mean really long, time ago there was a mare named Summer Sun and a stallion named Snow Light. They lived in a tribe of mostly earth ponies, but, occasionally, there were families of pegasi or unicorns. Their tribe had lived in the same forest for as long as anyone could remember. But this story isn’t about Summer and Snow. It is instead about their two daughters.
It had been one of the hottest summers ever. The sun laughed at the ponies below as they tried to cover it with clouds. The sun would instantly evaporate the clouds and would stab rays of light through the forest’s canopy. Unfortunately this day was in the smack middle of summer, therefore the hottest, so of course Summer Sun’s baby had decided to meet the world today. As Summer Sun held her baby she looked and saw her child’s blindingly white coat and decided to name her after the only the more blinding than her. That was how Celestial Light got her name.
This is where I come into the story. Its about a year and a half later that I decide I want to look my mother, Summer Sun, in the eyes. It was the dead of Winter with barely any food. My name was Lunar Sun. It was given to me because the moon was shining so brightly that night. Celestial and I were complete opposites. Celestial had cried loudly as a baby, had a coat as white as my father’s, Snow Light, and was an earth pony. I barely made a noise as a baby, had a coat as black as pitch, and was a unicorn.
My first memory of Celestial was her glaring at some of the other foals in our village. I had been walking to get some water and some of the older foals had stopped me. They then teased me about my horn and said some crude things I didn’t understand until much later. Celestial seemed to come out of no where and told the foals to leave me alone. She then guided me away while glaring at them over her shoulder.
Life in the village was almost always boring. Or at least for me. At night I would sit for hours and watch the moon rise and sink above and below the horizon. Obviously, the ponies aren’t doing very well out there, I thought to myself. I continued to look at the moon and saw how silvery and beautiful it was. If only the ponies in our village tried harder to make the moon move in a more beautiful way.
In the morning, although technically still night, I watched my sister leave our house looking proud. Today was her sixth birthday which meant she got to help raise the sun. Everypony looked forward towards their sixth birthday, it was the day we were considered old enough to help the village. I watched the sunrise from the roof of our house. It was probably the most beautiful I had ever seen. Almost as soon as the sunrise was finished I saw my sister running back to the house.
I nearly forgot to catch myself with telekinesis as I jumped from the roof to get to her. As I bound to her she rushes to get her saddlebags off. “Did you see the sunrise? It was so awesome! It seemed so much easier than what all the others complain about,” Celestial says in a rush.
“Ok, ok, just tell me how they raise the sun!” all of the children under six were not to ask about it, but I knew Celestial would tell me.
“Well, everybody does a different part. Forest Green (the one other unicorn in our village) used her magic to help levitate it off the horizon. Blaze, Cloudy Day, and Purple Sunset (the only pegasi) all flapped their wings as hard as possible to create a wind to help lift the sun. Then the rest of the village (all of the earth ponies) stomped as hard as possible to shake it off the earth!” Celestial then paused to breathe. After a few seconds she continues. “I stomped as hard as I could and it almost seemed like the sun rose a bit faster!” I’m excited for her even though I know the sun couldn’t have risen any faster for her. Both of us were only little fillies.
The rest of the day Celestial and I were at home celebrating her birthday. As usual for a sixth birthday, everyone in town was invited. Celestial might have been ‘that weird unicorn’s sister’ but she was still the most popular filly in town. With her radiant white pelt, soft, flowing pink mane, and lavender pink eyes she was instantly the most beautiful pony in town. I missed a big portion of the all day party due to my unusual sleeping pattern. I managed to wake up at seven o’clock which left only two more hours until the sun went down.
I ran to the room Celestial and I shared. I then went to the window where I watched the moon every night and pulled out Celestial’s secret birthday present. I walked outside to where Celestial was being given a multitude of gifts. Since everypony had come she had a large line of ponies waiting to give her gifts. She had a lot of exotic ones like a jar of blue dust that, apparently, if sprayed on a pony it would make the pony do funny things. Another gift was a blanket with a sun on it. The blanket was from a colt who everypony knew had a crush on Celestial. Some gifts were mundane like a new bucket for fetching water. Finally everypony had finished giving their gifts. Unfortunately then it was time for everybody to go lower the moon.
I walked back to the house sadly. I hadn’t had time to give Celestial my very special gift. I plopped down next to the window and looked out. As the sun sank with unusual grace, the moon rose with the same unsteadiness. The moon hung in the sky alone, almost like me. Almost thirty minutes later Celestial trudged into the house looking exhausted.
“Raising the moon is much harder than raising the sun,” she panted as she plopped into bed. She looked ready to fall asleep so I ran to her quickly.
“Wait, Wait Celestial!” I nearly shouted at her. “ I still have my gift to you…” I said quieter. I handed it over carefully.
She looked at it for a moment then pulled me into a hug. “Thank you so much, Lunar,” she said into my mane.
The gift I had given Celestial was a picture of us playing together under a beautiful moonrise.
“Not exactly, but I’ve only just begun my story. There is still a lot more to tell.”
“Okay, I’m sorry I interrupted, please go on.”
“Apology accepted, now where was I? Oh yes, a few months later…”
~
A few months later, after Celestial’s six birthday, was the annual harvest. Even though I was still four, I was only two months shy of being five, I was allowed to help with the harvest. Unfortunately “helping” meant delivering sandwiches to everypony whenever he or she got hungry. My lucky sister got to deliver water, which was considered a higher job than delivering sandwiches. Or at least it was higher in my mind.
“Hey! Hey, Lunar!” yelled a familiar voice. As I suspected the voice belonged to Red Oak. Red Oak was a colt almost the same age as me, but, as I constantly reminded him, I was three months older. For some reason he insisted on following me around everywhere. I wasn’t a very social filly since most of the other foals in the town ignored me, so when he followed me around it got on my nerves.
Slowly I turned around. “Hello, Red,” I muttered to the ground. Suddenly my view of the ground was interrupted by a brown body barrelling into me. I layed on the ground a few seconds stunned.
“I am so sorry Lunar! I just slipped and went flying! Are you alright?” Red babbled.
“I’m fine Red! Get off of me!” I almost screamed at him. The truth was I was very not fine, but he had seemed to have forgotten he was still standing on me.
“Are you sure Lunar? Your leg looks kind of funny…” Red said, trailing off.
I knew which leg he was talking about. The leg that felt like it was burning. The leg that, when I looked at it, was bent at an unnatural angle. It was then I let my scream out.
Red instantly looked scared, and within a matter of seconds Celestial was at my side. “Oh my sun! What happened, you know what nevermind. We need to get her to Rose Dust NOW!” As Celestial said all of this Blaze, a yellow colored pegasus, rocketed down to land beside me.
“Don’t worry Celestial, I’ll get her to Rose immediately,” and, being the pegasus she was, added, “They don’t call me the fastest pegasus for nothing!” With that she rushed to Rose.
As we landed in front of Rose’s house, Rose came galloping out. “What happened? Get her inside on the table.”
Blaze took me inside the house and laid me on the table. At this point I had stopped screaming, so I laid there numb and silent. Rose fed me some herbs which made me fall into a dark sleep. Or at least it was dark at first. Soon I was dreaming, except this time I could tell this was a dream.
I was back in the orchard where I had just injured my leg. This time though there were baskets full of apples everywhere and nopony within view. I felt greedy but I took an apple and bit into it. I was overwhelmed by how good it tasted, and I proceeded to eat the whole thing in under a minute. As I kept walking I almost stepped on somepony.
“Oh my sun! I’m sorry!” I said quickly to a somewhat familiar pony.
“Its alright little miss. Hey don’t I know you?” Said the familiar stallion. It was then I recognized him. It was Golden Pebble, one of the oldest ponies in town. He was known to doze off in the strangest of places.
“Well, I’m Lunar, sir,” I respond as politely as possible. Most of the foals of the town thought me weird, and I didn’t need any adults thinking of me like that.
“Why what a polite little filly you are! Well, if you don’t mind I’m going to get back to my nap,” he said as he laid back down. As he closed his eyes, the trees, apple baskets, and even the ground started to fade away. It was almost as if I was waking up from a dream, but, instead of waking up in bed, I was back to the blackness.
After what seemed like hours, a new setting started to materialize around me. As I looked around, I was next to the river where Celestial and I would play all the time. In the river was Celestial splashing around happily. I gasp at the sight of myself. I’m playing in the river with my sister. When I start to walk out of the river towards myself I tried to run away but found whenever I tried to lift my hooves they were stuck to the ground. Then I was running away but there was no more other me around. Suddenly I was falling, but it didn’t hurt. Just like before my leg was bent at a weird angle. Celestial is suddenly standing there with tears running down her face.
“Oh, Lunar I never should have left you! This is all my fault! I am so sorry,” she sobs into my fur.
Since the leg doesn’t hurt me I stand up. “Celestial this isn’t your fault! You had nothing to do with me getting hurt!” I say to her.
“B-but I could have watched you closer! Made sure nothing could ever hurt you!” she sobbed louder.
“Celestial you can’t watch me forever! You’d become what the adults call a stalker! I think…” I thought about if I was right.
“I guess…” Celestial said slowly. She got up and started to walk back towards the river I started to follow her, but I almost fell over in a sudden burst of pain. In front of me walked another me. At this point though everything was fading again, and my leg was experiencing another bout of stabbing pain.
I realized I was waking up when everything had finished dissolving. I opened my eyes. It was then I saw I was still in Rose’s house. Instead of being alone this time, though, my mom and Celestial were there. They were both asleep but were quickly awoken by my groan of pain. Soon Rose was there trying to give me a new herb. This one didn’t put me to sleep.
“Lunar I’m so sorry,” Celestial said. My mother had just left to talk to Rose Dust privately, so it was just Celestial and me.
“Celestial this isn’t your fault! You had nothing to do with me getting hurt,” I tell her the same way I told her in my dream.
Instead of looking relieved, Celestial looked confused. “That’s weird, I just had a dream with you in it. You said almost the exact same thing.”
“That is weird! What a coincidence!” I say innocently. It wouldn’t be until after my sixth birthday that I realized that I had really been walking in another pony’s dream.