Discord's initial attack was halted by the combined efforts of everypony in Equestria, and now all suffer equally as he toys with them from his confinement. Desperate for a working solution, the ruling Triumvirate resolves to create the perfect ponies to embody Harmony itself and break free from Discord. A Messianic destiny is hard for anypony to bear, however. The story of Celestia and Luna.
It emerged from the depths of the earth one day, exploding forth in a peaceful meadow on the outskirts of an Earth Pony town called Everfree, nigh to the center of the Kingdom. The ponies that bore witness were amazed at how immediately the land seemed to revolt from their command; trees growing wild, animals gone feral, all things moving of their own accord. At the center of the maelstrom was an abomination, a creature that defied description but seemed to be something of many things: of eagle and goat, lion and hart, and dragons of varying breeds. The learned would deem him of the genus Draconequus, but all would come to know him for what he brought unto the world: Discord.
This Discord bore powers more catastrophic than the most fearsome of monsters, making the earth below and the heavenly bodies above turn their backs on pony-kind. Ponies that met him came away changed, in body or mind, warped to be lunatics or monsters. This was the fate met by the First Company of the Knights of Equestria, sent to dispatch the monster. Those who returned alive from among pegasi, earth ponies, or unicorns would wreak havoc in their hometowns until they were imprisoned or otherwise subdued.
Sun and Moon charged through the sky heedlessly under Discord’s direction, at times both visible, at times both shrouded, plunging the land into absolute dark. Day and Night ceased to be, and instead there was endless time, marked only by when ponies felt tired enough to sleep. He seemed to delight in seizing control of the clouds away from the pegasi, but only one at a time or in groups. Clouds would rain any liquid but water, or take on undue shapes or properties. Fierce storms would tear across the land at will. The calamities meant crops soon began to decline, and hardship spread across the land.
All was not lost, however, for whatever dark caprice drove Discord compelled him not to leave his wild domain, but only to watch it slowly grow and encroach upon the surrounding countryside as he tormented attacking Equestrian Knights and twisted the heavens to his will. Thus it was that most of the land was safe from his darker designs, subject merely to his manipulation of the heavens. Free from direct assault, the lords of the land devised countermeasures. All magically-able unicorns were enlisted to encircle the chaotic forest, sealing away the evil behind a magic barrier. The combined power of so many was so great that not even the monstrous Discord could break the barrier, and so the threat was contained for a time.
~~0000~~
“Mommy, why are me and Celestia so different? How come we get a horn and wings but you, Daddy, Lapis, and Russ don’t have them?”
“I told you this before, Luna dear, you and Celestia are Alicorns because one of your ancestors was a Pegasus, and another was an earth pony. In fact, your great-grandmother Garnet was also an Alicorn, because of the marriages between the leaders of Equestria.”
“But how is it just me and Celestia? You’re all just normal unicorns? I mean, not just normal unicorns, I mean…”
Queen Amethyst laughed. “I know what you mean, Luna. The truth is we don’t know how it works when different pony tribes marry and have a foal; that’s just how it is.”
“Thanks, Mommy,” Luna said, and the little Alicorn filly trotted away.
Queen Amethyst smiled. Little Luna had been very inquisitive all her life, much more so than her sister. The young Celestia was often content to accept things for what they were, but Luna wanted to know everything about everything with all the eagerness of foalhood. Her sister was less reckless in temperament, quite calm and dignified for a filly her age, but not without her own mischievous spirit. Amethyst didn’t know where Celestia got her sense of humor from, as it matched neither hers nor her husband’s. Of course, Celestia and Luna were nothing if not unique, and Amethyst treasured them all the more for it, much as she treasured her other foals, Lapis Lazuli and Chival Russ.
Life with her husband, Starry Knight, and their four foals, was a constant joy, but diminished from what it could have been. Yes, Queen Amethyst was ruler of the unicorns, dwelling in a grand palace as one of the ruling triumvirate of Equestria with a loving family, but she was raising her family and ruling her ponies in a time of crisis and suffering.
There was little enough food since Discord had come, especially as she insisted that the royal family be treated no better than all the ponies who suffered under the food rationing. Canterlot had become badly depopulated, the unicorns away trying to keep the evil contained and only barely succeeding. The other tribes fared just as poorly, with the pegasi waging a constant fight against the clouds that wreaked havoc under the Draconequus’ twisted direction and the earth ponies struggling to raise enough food for all despite the poor weather and the erratic cycles of the sun and moon. Queen Amethyst felt pity for all the ponies of the land, wishing for the day when Discord was defeated, and hoping that she had the strength to play her part. According to her Court Sorceress, however, a change was due to come quite soon indeed.
Discord’s machinations caused hardship for everypony, but also annoyed and disturbed everypony on a smaller level. The Draconequus’ control over the heavens meant that it was nigh impossible to keep track of time, with only the most learned scholars able to accomplish this feat, and also meant that nopony really knew when to sleep and when to wake. The rule of thumb in the palace was to sleep whenever you were tired, so long as either Amethyst, Knight, or Lapis were awake to watch over the younger foals whenever they were awake. The Queen was weary after another… well… she couldn’t really call it “day” as the sun had risen five separate times since she had woken up, with a partial solar eclipse happening once, but she was weary nonetheless, and went to her bed and went to sleep as the Sun and Moon danced circles around one another in the sky above.
“Mommy, Daddy! Come quick!” Queen Amethyst and Starry Knight shot to wakefulness, seeing the dark-furred young filly hopping frantically at their bedside, struggling to get aloft on her dusk-colored wings. “It’s Celestia!” Luna shouted, a look of abject terror on her face. “Something really weird’s happening to her!” The two unicorn royals leapt out of bed and dashed out of their room, leaving the young Alicorn in their dust. They saw the problem immediately, blinding golden light that was pouring out of the open door to the room that Celestia and Luna shared.
“Celestia, what’s wrong?” Starry Knight barked as he and Amethyst galloped into the room. Both stopped short once they got inside, expressions of horror etched on their faces as they saw the young Alicorn filly floating above her bed, wings flapping gently as blinding golden light shot forth from her horn. Her horn and both of her eyes glowed fierce and hot as she writhed in the air.
“I don’t know!” Celestia shouted back, sounding confused and afraid. “I’m not doing this! I can’t stop it!”
Amethyst and Starry Knight looked on in horror, and would have missed the next occurrence if it weren’t for Luna’s prying eyes. “Look! Look!” Luna shouted, pointing past her sister and out the window of their bedroom. Their bedroom window looked east, and just as Celestia arched her head in the midst of her crisis, the sun slowly crested over the eastern horizon. Dawn was coming, the sun rising at the speed and in the place it was supposed to rise. Another burst, brighter than the Sun, caused all in the room to shield their eyes, and when they opened them again, Celestia had landed in a heap on her bed. On her flank, a cutie mark in the shape of the sun was visible.
“What… what was that?” Celestia asked.
“You raised the sun, Celestia!” Luna shouted, sounding overjoyed. “And you got your cutie mark! That was amazing!”
“Could you please take Luna out, dear?” Amethyst asked.
“Right,” Starry Knight said. “Come along, Luna.”
“What? Why?” Luna protested, as Starry Knight picked her up by magic and pulled her out of the room. Amethyst shut the door, tears in her eyes.
“What’s wrong, Mom?” Celestia asked. “Why are you crying?”
“I’m so proud of you,” Amethyst sobbed. “I’ve waited for this day all your life. So many ponies have…”
“So many ponies have been waiting for me to get my cutie mark?” Celestia asked. “Why? And why was it so different for me? It wasn’t like that when Lapis or Russ got their cutie marks.”
“We’ve been waiting to tell you this, Celestia, waiting until you were old enough to understand,” Amethyst said, climbing onto the bed next to the filly that she had raised as one of her own.
“Tell me what?”
“About Project Harmony, about how you were created.”
“Created?”
“Please, Celestia. Know that your father and I love you just like our other foals. That will never change.”
“I know, Mom,” Celestia said, curling up next to her on the bed. “Please, go ahead.”
“Alright. It all began when Discord first appeared…”
“We cannot hold out like this,” said Commander Gale. “It is well that we have contained the evil, but Discord still holds us captive from his own captivity. My Pegasus Knights are engaged in constant war with the clouds, which have fallen under his command, and we are worn to the bone. According to those who can still keep track of time, it has been 17 months since we started this deadlock, and there is no end in sight. What is to be done?” Commander Gale Force, recently appointed Supreme Commander of the Pegasi of Equestria, was a goldenrod-furred Pegasus mare with a slim white mane and tail and a cutie mark depicting a silver arrow in flight. She had been appointed after veteran Commander Silver Bolt had fallen to madness at the hooves of Discord. He was now imprisoned in Cloudsdale, and the pegasi had been left to face the chaos in the skies under the green new Commander, who suddenly found herself one of the ruling triumvirate of Equestria.
“My people suffer as well,” Queen Amethyst said. “Foals separated from their mothers and fathers as they dedicate themselves solely to keeping the evil contained, fillies, colts, mares, and stallions all spending all their days in magical exhaustion, losing all vigor or joy in their lives as they focus everything on their one task. The Commander is right: is this life any better than if Discord were allowed to roam free?” Queen Amethyst was six generations descended from Queen Platinum, one of the three co-founders of Equestria when she had been a mere Princess. Queen Amethyst was known neither for her boldness nor for her power, but she was deeply compassionate for her unicorns and all the ponies of Equestria. She had a royal purple coat and horn, with a mane and tail of aquamarine and, fittingly, an amethyst gemstone cutie mark that was barely discernible in the color of her coat.
“The earth ponies shoulder their part of the burden, as usual,” Chancellor Radishred scowled. “We work as hard as we can to coax food from the land even as the heavens have gone out of control. We will hold out as long as we can, but conditions are slowly deteriorating to something resembling the chaos that existed before the Foundation. This Discord is going to destroy our way of life, one way or another. We need action!” he added, stamping as his face tinged with anger. “Harmony must be restored, as swift as we can restore it, and that means crushing this enemy of all ponies.” Radishred, elected Chancellor of the earth ponies was the third of the triumvirate that ruled Equestria. He was a real, salt-of-the-earth farmer pony who had fought his way up the ranks of earth pony politics, a terror to anypony who got in his way. He was a stallion with a rusty brown coat, pale yellow mane, and red radish cutie mark.
The Triumvirate had gathered at the Hall of Council, across the plaza from the Unicorn Palace in Canterlot. They stood at a triangular table built for convocations of the Triumvirate. It was not neutral ground, but nobody could deny that the unicorns had the most lavish accommodations of the three tribes, and the leaders had known it would be foalish to be so petty as to move the political center somewhere less fitting out of mere jealousy. Aside from a pair of unicorn guards at the gate, the triumvirate was alone. So much of the commanding staff, dignitaries, underlings, and associates were involved in dealing with the ongoing crisis. “Nobody debates that, Chancellor,” Commander Gale said, “but we cannot afford recklessness. That’s how we lost Commander Silver Bolt, and so many brave knights.”
“You know, if we let our setbacks keep us from action, all the crops in Equestria would be dead by now,” Radishred said.
An odd look came over Gale’s face, but Amethyst interceded before Gale could reply. “We need to think of the ponies, Chancellor,” she said. “All of them. The knights are brave to bear so much of the burden for protecting us all, but it is our job to make sure that even they do not suffer without cause. One of my subjects proposed something that might banish this evil altogether, lessening the risk to everypony. Guards, would you please?”
The unicorn guards’ horns glowed and the door to the chamber swung open. Through the threshold trotted an elderly unicorn mare. Once her coat had been of spring green with a sleek orange mane, and though age had dimmed the color of both, her eyes remained as bright as they had ever been; a deep, aqua blue. Her cutie mark depicted a well, into which a gold coin was being thrown. “You have met my Court Sorceress, Chancellor,” Amethyst said, “but I would like to introduce you, Commander Gale, to Wishwell the Wise.”
“Your Excellency, Your Majesty, Commander,” Wishwell said, bowing. She stood, then fired a blast of orange magic out of the window. The Moon had risen sometime since the convocation had begun, so her magic bolt was easily visible as it traveled away to a glowing dome of white barely visible on the horizon. “Sorry about that,” she quipped. “Have to help keep that barrier up. Anyhoo, let’s get to it.”
Commander Gale arched her eyebrows, noting the sudden drop in formality.
“Don’t worry about it,” Radishred whispered, leaning towards her. “She thinks she’s too old to waste too much time on politeness, but she’s a magic genius.”
“You’re right, I am.” Wishwell said, popping up between Gale and Radishred. “I’m a link in a tradition of magic dating back to the foundation of Equestria with Clover the Clever and her mentor, Starswirl the Bearded, and I’ve magicked us up a way out of this whole Discord thing: Project Harmony.”
“So?” Radishred grunted, “where is it?”
“Cool yer hooves, earthie,” Wishwell barked back. “It’s not gonna be easy, that’s why I needed to get some approvals over this.”
“Please proceed,” Amethyst said gently. Radishred was correct in that Wishwell was not entirely there in her advanced age, and part of that made her mildly prejudiced against non-unicorns. Her prejudice and cavalier attitude had not mixed well with Radishred’s bellicosity the last time they met, and Amethyst was eager to maintain harmony in her own small way.
“Right,” Wishwell said. “Well, we know the Draconequus works by wresting control over that which has traditionally been controlled by the ponies: our bodies, our personalities, the weather, plants and animals, the sun and the moon. He’s more powerful than anypony, and that’s how he gets away with it. So what we need is a pony more powerful than the Draconequus. Somepony to embody Harmony itself to fight the Draconequus’ Discord.”
“But where does such a pony exist?” Gale asked, confused.
“No,” Wishwell replied. “Even if we had the leisure to choose the finest or strongest pony in the land, nopony can keep everything in Harmony. Each tribe has its own role, so we’d need a pony that embodies all things.”
“But interbreeding doesn’t work like that,” Radishred scoffed. “Even if it did, we’d need two generations to get the three groups mixed.”
“Keep your mind out of the gutter, earthie,” Wishwell snorted. “That’s the part I got figured out, and I’d do it myself, but being Harmony and all, I need help from you and the Commander.”
“How long will this plan take?” Gale asked.
“Sixteen years. Fourteen if we do it right.”
“Sixteen years?!?” Radishred fumed. “It hasn’t even been two yet, and look at how we’re struggling! Surely we could come up with a plan we could execute with hooves on the ground quicker than that!”
“But could we?” Gale said nervously. “If Commander Silver Bolt couldn’t do it… and the enemy has only been getting stronger in his forest since then…”
“Wishwell’s plan would be safer. We have to think of the ponies who would die or go mad at the hands of that monster, what would happen if we attacked with a shred of doubt. It is our duty to them,” Amethyst said. “Any path we choose will be hard, but we must try to save as many as possible from a horrible fate. I support Wishwell’s plan.”
“If it’s a question of endurance, the earth ponies can do it,” Radishred said. “If no-one’s willing to step up for sixteen years, we’ll still be here, feeding ponykind. I’ll support you, for Harmony and all.”
“I defer to your wisdom,” Commander Gale said plainly. “You have my support.”
“Good,” Wishwell said. “Project Harmony,” she added, placing a hoof on the table.
“Project Harmony,” the Triumvirate repeated, placing their hooves on the table in turn.
~~0000~~
“There,” Radishred growled as he and an earth pony mare finished pulling a cart into the chamber. Wishwell had summoned him to the Canterlot Magic Academy, once the center of magic learning in the unified kingdom of Equestria, but now the home of only the few unicorns that could be spared from the barrier, a sadly diminished place. Queen Amethyst and Commander Gale had also gathered there.
Amethyst’s horn glowed, lifting a cloth-bound bundle out of the back of the cart, levitating it for a space before unwrapping it on the floor. “A spread of high-quality earth pony-grown food,” Radishred continued. The spread was all natural, none of the foods being treated or prepared, and none looking any less appetizing for that fact: apples of various hues, golden straw, a rainbow of fresh-cut flowers, carrots, turnips, radishes, beets, celery, lettuce, and cucumber, a small barrel of milk and a larger barrel of water. Amethyst pawed at the floor anxiously; this was much more food than she had had in almost two years, a veritable feast.
“All the foods a pony needs to eat, perfect,” Wishwell said. “Commander Gale, do you have what I asked for?”
“Two feathers from the finest flyers from amongst my knights,” Gale said, producing two Pegasus feathers and setting them beside the food.
“Two feathers?!?” Radishred fumed, stamping angrily. “Do you realize how much work it took to raise this food with the sun and the weather acting like this, and all the pegasi had to put up was two lousy feathers?” Gale hung her head, while Wishwell snorted. The mare with Radishred (his wife, Sour Grapes) stamped along with her husband.
“Please, Chancellor,” Amethyst soothed. “We know it was much to ask of you. This food is much more than anypony is rationed with nowadays, but we need it for Wishwell’s spell.”
“The earth ponies have always had to pull their weight when nopony else did,” Sour Grapes scoffed. “I guess it’s no different now.”
“Ponies, please!” Amethyst shouted. “This is Project Harmony. We all make sacrifices for the good of everypony!”
“So what are the unicorns giving up?” Radishred asked, calmer but more accusatory.
His query hit Amethyst, who shifted on her hooves nervously. “I have to perform the spell,” Wishwell said instead.
Radishred’s face reddened anew, but he seemed to think better of it after a moment, and said nothing, instead changing the course of conversation. “So what else is needed?” he asked, looking over the chamber. Wishwell had a number of items arrayed as if points in an incomplete pentagon. At the far end was a burning torch, next to it a goblet filled with a blindingly bright golden light, and Wishwell levitated the feathers to sit opposite the goblet.
“To create a pony who embodies Harmony between the three races and who can wrest control of the world back from Discord, we need a pony with elements of each of the races; an Alicorn.”
“But Alicorns have existed before,” Queen Amethyst said. “My grandmother was one. The royal family intermarried with previous earth pony senators and great Pegasus knights. Grandmother was a great mare, but not a miracle-worker.”
“Correct, but the different tribes were not in balance in Queen Garnet. Here we have one element from each tribe: unicorn magic to conduct the spell, Pegasus feathers, and earth-pony-made food. All living things are what they eat, so food is needed for the transmutation, and earth ponies have their special bond with growing things to make it uniquely elemental to them. But then I got two more ingredients to make this Harmony-pony truly special. First is that thing,” Wishwell said, indicating the burning torch. “That torch was lit with the Flame of Friendship, the flame that the Founding Heroines lit on the first Hearth’s Warming, and so the fire that was started by ponies’ love for one another will be the spark forming the Harmony-pony’s life.”
“So the pony will be literally born out of Harmony…” Gale breathed.
“Right again,” Wishwell continued. “And then this thing will give the pony her special power,” she said, indicating the goblet. “That’s liquid essence of sunlight, I made it myself. With that as her base, the Harmony-pony will have absolute control over the Sun, and restore normalcy to Equestria even before she’s old enough to defeat the Draconequus. Unfortunately, it means we won’t be able to make more like her; the spell I used can’t be repeated. Well, unless we kill her and take the sunbeam away…”
Everypony looked horrified, and Wishwell backtracked. “Just theory,” she assured. “Anyway, with the sunbeam in her, she’ll be one of a kind.”
“Hold a moment,” Radishred. “You keep saying “she, her,” is this pony gonna be a filly?”
“Yup,” Wishwell said. “And in answer to the unspoken “why,” dear Chancellor, it is because fillies and mares have always been good enough to lead the unicorns, so they’ll be good enough to lead Equestria.”
Radishred scowled, but made no comment.
“So, is all prepared?” Amethyst asked.
Wishwell magically re-wrapped the bundle of food, then levitated it and placed it as the fourth point on the pentagon, and then trotted over to the fifth point. “Now it is,” she said.
The sun set suddenly, the moon shooting up into the sky. “Perfect,” Wishwell said. “The Draconequus’ whims work to our favor. Now hold on to yer hooves!” Wishwell’s horn glowed a fierce orange, while her eyes lit blue. A glowing orb of magic flew from her horn as the other four components floated in towards the center. The food flew into the small orb, compressed into a tiny mass, followed by the feathers. Small flashes appeared of what was occurring at the center of the orb, the food and wings transforming into a barely-visible Alicorn foal, before the Fire of Friendship shot into the orb, quickly joined by the beam of sunlight, joining into an orb blinding enough to be the sun itself come down into that chamber. All ponies shielded their eyes, trying fruitlessly to keep out the light.
There was a squeal, one that extended into the cries of a newborn foal, prompting Amethyst, Radishred, and Sour Grapes to open their eyes first against the light. The late faded, allowing Gale and Wishwell to open their eyes, and all bore witness: a tiny baby foal with white fur, a pink mane and tail, and a horn and wings.
As the foal cried, her tiny horn glowed golden, the moon quickly setting and the sun slowly appearing over the horizon, at a speed nopony had seen it moving in for almost a year and a half; a beautiful sight for the triumvirate, who saw in it a glimpse of hope for the future, for an end to Discord.
“Meet the pony who will move the heavens,” Wishwell said, slowly approaching the crying foal. “Princess Celestia.”
Author’s Note: Bronyism, it’s a beautiful thing, ain’t it? Plenty of writing projects on my plate, and now Project Harmony is one of them. Anyway, good bit going on here, detailing the history of Celestia and Luna, and explaining some other things along the way.
The eclipse had lasted for two weeks now, to the wonder and amazement of almost everypony. It filled them with a mixture of hope and fear: hope because now indeed the sun rose and set in an established pattern, and the count of Time had resumed. For two weeks now, ponies could wake and sleep as they had in the time before the ascension of Discord, and for that they were glad. The sun and the moon now moved in perfect harmony, however, ironically breeding discord in the fact that now the sun was continuously hidden, visible as only a fiery halo behind a ball of darkness that roamed across the sky from dawn to dusk. Similarly, the moon seemed to have vanished from the night sky, so that now ponies slept through absolute blackness and awoke to a dimly-lit twilight world. Thus there was fear, for in the resumption of the passage of Time they were now denied the sun utterly.
The persistent cycle of eclipse and blackness was the focus of everypony’s attention, except for the youngest Princess dwelling in the Canterlot Palace. Despite her inquisitive nature and her great curiosity, Luna was relatively uninterested in the new movements of the heavenly bodies, and instead fixated on something much more local: the mysteries surrounding her Alicorn sister.
Ever since she had gotten her Cutie Mark, Celestia had been spending a lot of time out of the Palace, or spending a lot of time in discussions with their mother and father, private discussions that Luna and the other foals were excluded from. All of this secrecy and privacy was something that really fired Luna’s imagination, but no-one seemed to be able to satiate her curiosity. Luna badgered Mom and Dad endlessly, whispered questions to Celestia while she slept in hopes that her sister would let something slip, and bombarded Lapis and Russ with endless questions. Everypony had become quite annoyed with her, except Celestia herself, who seemed to genuinely regret not being able to tell her little sister about what was going on, but she remained adamant about keeping Luna in the dark.
Luna was nothing if not persistent, and with persistence she was eventually rewarded. It came on the fifteenth day since the sun had risen, the fourteenth day of eclipse. Luna had been lurking in the shadows of the Palace Gardens, nearly invisible in the perpetual twilight with her night-sky-blue coat. She had been playing in the dark, stalking imaginary foes as she pondered her next move in the great quest to figure out what was going on with Celestia, when she got her big break. Out of the darkness beyond the Palace Gates she heard voices, eventually seeing three ponies come into the garden: her mother, her sister, and Wishwell the Wise, the very aged unicorn sorceress who was one of only a small group of unicorns still living in Canterlot.
Amethyst cantered along slowly, for the benefit of the elderly Wishwell. In the 12 years since Celestia’s “birth,” old age had finally caught up to Wishwell, dimming more than the color of her mane and coat. Now her formerly deep-blue eyes had misted over, and she had lost much of her vivacity, becoming yet more cantankerous than she had been. Celestia floated along on her wings, a talent that still eluded Luna, who could not fly for more than a few minutes at a time, and who seemed to have no speed between “stop” and “zoom.”
Luna demonstrated that deficiency by leaping into the air and dashing towards her sister. “Celestia!” she shouted happily, “How are… whoa!” the dark-coated and white-coated sisters ended up in a heap on the ground.
“Did you miss me?” Celestia said, chuckling.
“Yup!” Luna said eagerly, “What were you…”
“Now dear,” Amethyst intervened, “you know she’s not allowed to answer that. You’ll find out when you’re older.”
“But I wanna knooooow!” Luna whined.
“Shut yer trap, Lapis,” Wishwell croaked. “Don’t bother Her Majesty or the Princess. They’ll tell you when they’re good and ready.”
“Lapis?” Celestia asked.
“Wishwell, that’s Luna,” Amethyst said gently.
“Yeah, I’m… Luna…” Luna trailed off. “Sorry for bothering you, bye!” and then Luna took wing and dashed off again.
“That filly ain’t right,” Wishwell said.
~00~
That night, in the pitch-blackness that night now was, only one creature stirred in all of Canterlot. Even the night guards had been retired in the past few weeks, seeing the pointlessness of attempting to perceive anything in the darkness. They could not have perceived the one creature currently moving, for its hooves were muted and only a subtle rustling of cloth could give it away. So it was that Luna made her attempt to get answers to the questions that had dogged her for the past two weeks, to finally discover what was going on with Celestia and why nopony would tell her about it.
She made her way carefully, through the empty courtyards of Canterlot and into the Magic Academy, where her target dwelt. She did not bump or crash into anything, for she was guided by a night-vision spell. Luna was a bit of a magical prodigy, knowing as many spells at age 8 as Celestia knew at age 12. With this spell, Luna eventually found her way into a bedroom, identified a lantern, and lit it.
“Eh? Whozzat?” Old age had brought pains to Wishwell, making her a perpetually light sleeper, awoken even by the dim light.
“It’s me, Chancellor Radishred.”
“Whaddaya doing here at this time of night?” Wishwell squinted against the dim light, seeing before her a mass of rusty brown-red. It certainly looked right. And that exactly had been Luna’s plan, after Wishwell had mistaken her for Lapis. Lapis was 16, nearly full-grown, and much larger than Luna, with a coat that was close to turquoise, rather than Luna’s night-sky-blue. Lapis also had a much smoother voice, and didn’t have wings. If Wishwell could mistake her for Lapis, then if Luna herself donned a disguise as simple as a rust-brown blanket with eye-holes cut in, and tried to make her voice sound male, she could pass for a grown-up, someone who Wishwell would be willing to talk to. She picked Radishred because he was a grown-up who she had met a few times before, one who lived outside the Palace and thus could be more likely to ask stupid questions.
“I just wanted to ask about Princess Celestia,” Luna said, throwing her voice low in an attempt that wouldn’t have fooled anypony if they didn’t already have one hoof in the grave. “What’s she been doing lately that’s so secretive? Why keep it a secret from me, uh, Princess Luna?”
“Still the dumb earthie,” Wishwell cackled. “Ain’t you remember?” You helped create them.”
“Create?”
“Celestia and Luna,” Wishwell said exasperatedly. “The results of Project Harmony, the perfect ponies who will wield the Elements of Harmony and defeat the Draconequus. Celestia’s just gotten her powers, and now we gotta teach her about them, but we still can’t tell Luna because it’d just scare her.”
“And then when do you tell me, whoops, her?”
“When she gets her cutie mark.”
“And what’s so special about her cutie mark? Why’m I, I mean, why is Luna so special?”
“By the windigoes, you’re dumb,” Wishwell swore. “I better tell ya the whole story so you don’t need to ask any more stupid questions. But get it through your thick skull this time!”
~~0000~~
The hope born with the rising of the sun on Celestia’s birth had a life of mere hours, for soon the moon swiftly rose and blocked out the sun, and the counsels of the triumvirate were shaken.
“You said she would have control over the heavens!” Radishred sneered. “But only the sun moves as it should while the moon moves in mockery of it, cheating us of light and hope.”
“Please, speak softer,” Amethyst said. She had the newborn Celestia in swaddling clothes, only a puff of pink mane visible as Amethyst levitated her, gently rocking the tiny Alicorn as she slept. “She needs rest.”
“She is only a newborn,” Commander Gale added. “Perhaps her power is incomplete?”
“No,” Wishwell said. “As newborns, unicorns will sometimes manifest their magic talent spontaneously, as Celestia did. That Discord has brought out the moon means that she does not have a special bond with the moon as she does with the sun.”
“Then you’ve failed?” Radishred asked, glaring at Wishwell.
“Perhaps,” said Wishwell, returning his glare. “I’ll need to meditate on this.”
“And in the meantime, the hardship continues,” Radishred said.
So the first weeks of Celestia’s life were marked with vigorous academic debate, as Wishwell debated with her small cadre of apprentices and sorceresses, a handful of scholars left at the Magic Academy and spared from serving at the barrier. They debated the extent of Celestia’s latent powers and the nature of Harmony. The tumult did not touch the newborn Princess, however, as she was received lovingly into the royal unicorn household, as daughter to Amethyst and Starry Knight, and little sister to the 4-year-old Lapis Lazuli and 6-month-old Chival Russ.
Celestia knew only sunlight for the first weeks of her life, but the constant sun was a worrying omen, casting a shadow over the debate. As if to prove his continued supremacy in the heavens, Discord kept the sun in the sky for a time equal to 47 days before he started changing things up again. It was when the sun finally disappeared from the sky that Wishwell had an epiphany, solving the problem. She called the triumvirate back to meet, delivering her realization in four simple words:
“Solitude is not harmony,” Wishwell declared before the rulers, gathered again in the great meeting hall of the Triumvirate. “That’s the short version of what went wrong.”
“What do you mean?” Gale asked.
“The point of fighting Discord is to use a pony who can embody Harmony itself. That’s why Princess Celestia has the flame of harmony in her, and I figured this would make her elementally harmonious, able to control harmony and smash Discord once she comes of age. But it’s fundamentally flawed to assume that one pony can embody harmony on her own. Look at the sun, which regulates time and the rhythm of sleep and waking. Yet we see how Discord, in keeping the sun aloft so long, uses it to his advantage. The sun alone does not create harmony: it needs the moon. Day needs night to complement it and keep all things in order. So Celestia needs another, equal yet different, who can work together with her to create true Harmony when the time comes. In short,” Wishwell added, “she needs a sister. One created just like her, but based on the essence of the moon instead of the sun.”
“So we must make another?” Gale asked. “I thought you said that the borrowed essence of sunlight meant that we could not make another such pony?”
“There are plenty of bodies in the heavens,” Wishwell said. “I chose sunlight to be the basis for Celestia because the sun is the greatest of the heavenly bodies, and having its power would likely make Celestia supreme in the sky, able to wrest control of the Heavens back from the Draconequus, and subsequently restore order in its entirety. I can condense the essence of the Moon using the same magical process, it’s just that no other pony will be able to have that kind of control over the Moon or Sun while either of these ponies live.”
“Impossible!” Radishred fumed. “This one,” he said with a nod towards the sleeping newborn “used up the best of this year’s reserves. All of it. You needed good food, so we took the best-quality stuff from what we would have set aside for emergencies. As it is, everypony’s going to have to tighten their saddles until we can get another harvest out, and the Windigoes only know how long that’s going to take, or whether that harvest will yield enough. Plus, if we can’t set aside enough food in one go, it will spoil long before the next harvest.”
“That should not be a problem,” Amethyst interjected, noting the growing redness on Radishred’s face and the narrowing scowl on Wishwell’s. “We know of spells that can suspend certain objects in time. That should keep the food fresh for as long as needed.”
“Even so,” Radishred said, calming somewhat. “It will take some time. It’s almost impossible to predict harvest cycles now, but I would go with two years, maybe three.”
“We will endure,” Amethyst said, brushing her muzzle against the sleeping bundle she levitated before her. “We owe it to those who depend on us. We will not yield until their future is safe.”
“Right,” Gale said, though she sounded less than confident. “If it is possible, we must do it. It is our burden to everypony: Project Harmony,” she placed a hoof firmly on the table.
“Project Harmony,” everypony said.
~00~
In reality, it was almost four whole years before the Earth Ponies managed to raise enough surplus, high-quality food. It was almost as if the Draconequus understood their plans, for he once again hijacked the clouds of the sky, sending them to rain salt-water over the fields in an effort to poison the land on multiple occasions. Each time Commander Gale managed to rally her knights to beat back the assault, though each time it was a struggle.
Eventually, however, the food had been raised, and once again the triumvirate had reconvened at the Magic Academy, in the same chamber in which Celestia had been created. The arrangement was familiar to everypony in attendance: the Triumvirate, along with Wishwell and Radishred’s wife, Sour Grapes, and the arrangement of items necessary for the creation of the perfect pony: a large spread of hard-won food, a pair of Pegasus feathers, a torch burning with the pink Fire of Friendship, and a goblet filled with bright light. There were some differences, however. Wishwell had visibly aged in the last four years, Sour Grapes was now great with foal, the goblet this time was not filled with golden light, but with a bright, silver beam, and the sun was up rather than the moon, with the fiery orb tracing its way in lazy circles through the sky.
“Are you certain that you want to do this, Amethyst?” Radishred asked. He and his wife stood off to the side with the Queen of the unicorns. “You have three foals already. It wouldn’t be right to impose on your family too much.”
“It’s no imposition,” Amethyst said. “Even in these times, it is no burden to have more loving foals to take care of.”
“It just doesn’t feel right. Even if we did have to do more work than anyone to bring these ponies into the world, raising a foal is a lifetime commitment.”
“It would put us both at three foals each,” Sour Grapes added. “And I will bear this foal in a couple of months. That would mean little Luna would have a brother or sister just at her age as she grew up.”
“As I said, it’s no imposition. Ever since I was a little filly, I dreamed of having a large family when I grew up. Wishwell also believes it would be best if the two sisters were raised together, despite the four-year age difference. But you are quite welcome to come by as the crisis allows. There’s no reason that Luna and your new foal can’t be friends as they grow up. But Starry Knight and I have grown quite attached to Celestia, and we’ve been… looking forward to the creation of the moon pony. You called her Luna?”
“Sour Grapes came up with it,” Radishred said, rolling his eyes. “I figured it wasn’t fancy enough for a Princess.”
“It’s simple, but it’s pretty,” Sour Grapes replied, scowling at her husband. “It doesn’t need to be complicated to be elegant.”
“Like Wishwell is going to go for it,” Radishred said.
“Why would you care what she thinks? And who said she gets naming rights anyway?” Sour Grapes spat back. “Luna’s as much our pony as hers. She just came up with the idea, we had to put in the food.”
“Bet yer glad you haven’t gotten married yet,” Wishwell said to Gale, as the earth pony couple’s bickering grew loud enough to hear. “Yup, can’t beat the bachelorette life!”
“I do think Luna’s a pretty name,” Gale said, wanting to change the subject. “And it would go well with her sister. Celestia and Luna: the Alicorn Sisters.”
“I guess…” Wishwell replied. “Then she will be called Luna.”
Wishwell hung silent for a moment, listening as the earth pony spouses continued to bicker. “I said she shall be called Luna!” the elderly pony yelled with surprising vigor. “So you lot can quit yappin’ about it!” Sour Grapes and Amethyst both looked smiled, while Radishred rolled his eyes.
“Just get on with it,” he said shortly.
And so the triumvirate, along with the witness, gathered to witness the ritual. “You can see the goblet is this time filled with liquid moonbeam, but otherwise everything is much the same: an elemental balance of the three pony tribes, and flame lit from the Fire of Friendship to provide an elemental link to Harmony. With the moonbeam, Luna’s domain shall be the night and darkness, when ponies sleep and the world is renewed. With Princess Celestia, they shall fulfill the cyclical nature of Harmony, and together save us all from Discord.”
With that, Wishwell initiated the spell, the orange ball of unicorn-magic drawing in the earth pony-made food, the Pegasus feathers, the harmonious flame and the essence of moonlight, which came together in a blinding flash of silver before the familiar cries of a newborn foal were heard.
She was indeed as a shadow of her sister, having a coat as dark as the unspoilt night sky and a tuft of navy blue mane. As the tiny Alicorn cried, her horn glowed silver-blue, and the sun rapidly fell out of the sky as a crescent moon arose, beautiful and clear in the crisp night sky. “Princess Luna,” Amethyst said. “Welcome to the world.”
~00~
“And that’s how it happened,” Wishwell finished. She couldn’t help but tearing up a little, remembering that poignant moment, but she quickly composed herself. “Got it, Chancellor?” she stressed the title as far as her well-practiced sarcastic arts could carry her. “This really ain’t worth the lost sleep.”
“Yup, got it! Gotta go, bye!” Chancellor Radishred seemed to do an odd thing then, shedding his skin as a dark-colored mass bolted forth from Wishwell’s quarters.
“Moon pony, moon pony, moon pony, moon pony!” Luna cheered happily as she hopped through the darkness of Canterlot. “I’m the moon pony!” For the moment, Luna had absorbed only the most superficial elements of the story that she had tricked out of the aged Wishwell. So many questions had been answered, namely in how special she was. She and Celestia were special ponies, different from their other siblings, different than Mom and Dad. Celestia was meant to control the Sun, as she had when she had gotten her cutie mark a few weeks ago, while she, Luna, would control the moon when that day came. They were special ponies with the abilities of all three tribes and elements of the founding heroines of legend, as well as the power over heavenly bodies.
“I’m the moon pony!” Luna repeated as she bounced along. “This’ll be so great! Me and Celestia will have so much fun! We’ll get to use the sun and moon to fight the Draconequus and save everypony! Only we can do it,” she said, slowing now to a trot. “Only… us…” Luna stood alone in the darkness, a darkness she would have to defy, to tame with moonlight. She suddenly felt very small and very alone in the unnatural blackness.
~00~
“Sister?” a small voice came out of the dark.
“Yes, Luna?” a dim golden light broke through the darkness, focused around a pure white face framed in pink.
“Could I…?” Luna began awkwardly.
“Sure,” Celestia said, not needing to hear the rest. “Hop on in.”
“Thanks.” Luna jumped into her sister’s spacious bed, scooting over next to Celestia’s larger body, navigated by the light from her horn. Though the Alicorn sisters shared a bedroom, still Luna occasionally made this request, when she was especially frightened. “Good night, Celestia.”
Celestia placed her wing over Luna’s frame as the light from her horn went out. “Good night, Luna.”
And there in the darkness of Discord’s unnatural night, the seeds of harmony began to germinate.
“Wake up, come on. The sun just rose, and we need to get the plants uncovered.”
“Pray, is it too much to ask that you give Us more than three hours to sleep?”
“I don’t care what you lot get up to in that fancy castle, but here we get up with the sun, whatever the sun decides to do. And quit with the royal speech. I’m the First Lady of the Earth Ponies, I’m on your level.”
“Ugh,” Luna said as stretched in bed, abandoning use of the Royal Speech for the moment. “When am I going to get out of here?”
“When you get your Cutie Mark, you know that,” Sour Grapes said irately. “Up you get.” Sour Grapes had a merlot-toned coat with a dark green mane and a blue concord grape Cutie Mark, as well as a perpetually dour expression befitting her name.
“Is Radishred back yet?” Luna asked.
“No, and he’ll get back a lot quicker if you quit asking,” Sour Grapes said. The mare left the room, and Luna rolled out of bed. The Alicorn Princess had passed her twelfth birthday some scant weeks ago, though she had only been informed of that fact a few days ago. The sun had reverted to the Draconequus’ control, and once again the passage of time was something that could be assessed only by the cadre of scholars and mystics in the academy at Canterlot. For a few weeks after Celestia had gained her Cutie Mark and taken control of the sun, the Draconequus had defied her by placing the moon in a constant solar eclipse. This had allowed for the passage of time, but had also left Equestria with no sunlight at all, which all knew would soon become more disastrous than anything else Discord had wrought thus far in all the years of his confinement. So it was that the Triumvirate had told Celestia to voluntarily relinquish control of the sun, allowing the Draconequus’ capricious and unpredictable movements of the heavenly bodies to provide Equestria with at least some life-giving sunlight, rather than none at all.
After the timeless period resumed, the Alicorn Sisters had been split up, another resolution of the Triumvirate. Luna saw it as punishment for her curiosity, for having fooled the aged Wishwell the Wise and discovered her true nature before the appointed time, although the Triumvirate had not called it punishment. Instead it had been called “education.” The elder Celestia, with her solid grasp of flying basics, had been sent to live with the Pegasus ponies of their ancestral home of Pegasopolis, while Luna had been sent to Coltsdam, the only fortified burg of the Earth Ponies, and their place of Congress. Celestia would learn to fight in the tradition of Pegasus Hoplites and aid them in their war against the clouds that the Draconequus still controlled. Luna, meanwhile, learned Earth Pony politics and the growing of food as she adapted to the basics of flight. The plan was to have them exchange places once Luna gained her Cutie Mark, sending her to learn flight when she was older, so that they would, at last, be trained in the knowledge of all three tribes, and ready to fight the Draconequus. It would be hard indeed to sustain their current existence that long, but everypony toiled in the hope that their deliverance from Discord would come in due time.
Yawning broadly, Luna trotted out of the guest quarters that had served as her bedroom for the last four years. “Good morning, your majesty,” she heard as a greeting.
“Don’t tease me. It’s not morning, and I told you not to call me that,” Luna sighed. “Unless you want me to start calling you “First Daughter” again.”
“No,” Beet Red laughed. Beet Red was the daughter of Chancellor Radishred and his wife, Sour Grapes. She was a few months younger than Luna, and a blank-flank just like her. She had her father’s rusty-brown coat and her mother’s dark green mane. She had been Luna’s constant companion throughout the past four years, and the Alicorn felt as close to her almost as she was to Celestia, who she now saw only irregularly, and never for very long. “It’s so embarrassing when ponies call me that.” She blushed furiously.
The two fillies left the Chancellor’s House, a well-adorned house in the midst of Coltsdam, where the current Chancellor Radishred lived with his wife, Sour Grapes, daughter Beet Red, and her older brother Redvine. Radishred himself had been away for several days, at a convening of the Triumvirate, while Redvine was helping an Earth Pony settlement in another part of the domain. It was a comfortable house across the town square from the Earth Pony Congress. The accommodations were not as large or elaborate as the Palace in which Luna had spent her earlier years, but she did not want for comfort that were still inaccessible to most ponies, as well as more food than was rationed to the peasantry (though not by much). Discord’s machinations had not effected housing, and so the leaders of Equestria were just as well-accommodated as they had been. Food was another story, of course. Although leaders did get more food rationed to them (which some were more reluctant to accept than others), they now ate less even than many commoners had in the days before the coming of the Draconequus. In those days, the Earth Ponies had seen to it that there was plenty for everypony, high and low, throughout Equestria, and although there had been much grumbling over prices, everypony had been largely content.
Luna and Beet Red went through the small, fortified town and out into the fields. Coltsdam was a fortified burg set at the foot of the Foal Mountains, along the Neighagara River, a ways to the East of Canterlot. The “dam” of Coltsdam was a low-lying dyke, which ran up to the fortress walls and forced the river to bend prematurely, creating a small lake from which floodgates led to irrigation trenches that serrated the fields beyond, creating some of the richest fields in the land.
The crops lately had come under threat from frost, of all things. It was something as subtle as a cold front that the Draconequus had sent up towards Coltsdam, something that would be easily dispatched by the Pegasi if they weren’t tied up fighting much more severe weather problems spawned by Discord in his captivity. The cold front meant that every night (which came on average once every eight hours) there was a danger of frost, which would kill some of the crops. After a three hour night, the farmers in and around Coltsdam were out uncovering those crops that were especially frost-sensitive, so that they could receive the sunlight. Beet Red and Luna followed Sour Grapes in a lane through the fields at a brisk pace. Luna trotted on the ground, for although she had finally begun flying in private, she avoided doing so in public to try to stop the inevitable, but it came just the same.
“Look at the filly with the First Lady.”
“Wings and a horn. My cousin was telling me, but I didn’t believe it.”
“She came from Canterlot, supposed to be some kind of unicorn mutant.”
Luna closed her eyes as she walked, but felt the burning gazes of the field-workers. Even after nearly four years here, she was still a curiosity, and she hated it. Initially that had not been so; she had liked the idea of being special when she was littler, and even knowing the burden she was to bear had not been imposing, since she would bear it together with her sister, it had felt almost like a game. Now, away from Celestia and as she grew she began to feel the weight of being different, feeling an inherent wrongness in the way ponies always stared or commented.
Of course, Luna was not alone in Coltsdam. “Get back to work, slackers!” Sour Grapes barked.
“Yeah, what are you looking at, butthead?” Beet Red added. Luna opened her eyes to see Beet Red smiling, and she returned the smile, though she still felt bad. “C’mon, cheer up Luna,” the filly said. “You know they’re just jealous.”
“Jealous or not, they should keep it to themselves,” Sour Grapes grumbled. “There should be a law against it.”
“Just forget about it,” Luna said. “Please,” she added, remembering her manners. Eventually, Sour Grapes and Beet Red detached to work on uncovering a row of tomato plants, while Luna stepped over to the next row and addressed the entire row of tomato plants at once, by magic. With a great many earth-ponies working and with Luna’s magical help, they were able to finish uncovering the frost-sensitive crops in about half an hour. They worked quickly out of fear that the sun would soon set again, and that they would lose all the sunlight, as was all too common. The irregular sun wreaked more havoc on the agrarian Earth Ponies, who had made a habit of rising and sleeping with the dawn and dusk, something that they largely enforced as the chaos came in, although they were obliged to break the habit if daylight or darkness endured too long. The livestock had it worse, with cows, pigs, chickens, and others all terribly confused all the time.
Half an hour into this day, however, it seemed that this day would be a longer one, as the sun was busy spinning around in circles dead center in the sky, as if ranging from high noon to about 1 PM to 11 AM and back again every couple of seconds, though the Draconequus was known for nothing if not for great capriciousness and a twisted malice, so there were never any guarantees of daylight. But the stalwart Earth Ponies often gave little regard for such contingencies, working with the sunlight they were given and reacting to unexpected things only as they came.
Confident that they were going to have more daylight to work with; Sour Grapes took Luna and Beet Red back to Coltsdam as the other field workers dispersed to their homes for a meal. It could not really be called “breakfast” because they might not have time for three meals that day, and also because each meal was composed of whatever rations had been set aside.
As they approached the Chancellor’s House, Beet Red stopped them. “Look!” she said, pointing skyward. “Dad’s home!” A chariot swept out of the sky, ornate and drawn by a pair of Pegasus Knights, bearing Chancellor Radishred.
“Thanks,” Radishred grunted as he hopped out of the chariot. With a veiled snort of contempt, the Pegasi leapt back into the air and flew off.
“What news of the Triumvirate?” Luna asked, rushing towards Radishred.
“Hold on,” Radishred said. “I don’t need any chatter before I get something in my stomach.”
The family returned to the house, seated as Sour Grapes retrieved their rationed meals. Luna stared obsessively at Radishred, desperate for any news of her family or her sister that might come from the Triumvirate. After scarfing down his meager rations: a clump of hay and half an ear of corn, she again accosted him.
“So?” she asked, practically pouncing on the dining-room table.
Radishred sighed. Every time he went on Triumvirate business… “Your sister’s fine. She’s off leading a battalion of Pegasus Knights against a nasty storm coming down from the Frozen North.”
“She gets to have all the fun,” Luna huffed.
“Yeah, fun…” Radishred snorted. “Anyway, most of it was about the two of you. I dunno. They told me not to tell you, but… you’re not gonna stop buggin’ me about it, so here it goes.”
The Triumvirate had convened for their biannual meeting once again, time to consult over leadership of Equestria and to take counsel against the enduring threat of the Draconequus. It was now almost 18 years since the crisis had begun, and yet Equestria endured. The younger generation knew nothing but rationing and hardship, and the malnourishment meant that ponies were more susceptible to disease and mischance, dying before their time. Despite this, Equestria endured: the Pegasi, now hardened by constant war with rogue clouds and storms, were run into a desperate state, but like many creatures driven to desperation, the need to survive caused them to thrive, and so the rebellious heavens never triumphed. The Unicorns, meanwhile, had organized their efforts at maintaining the magic barrier quite well, with a series of makeshift communities all around the barrier that kept the Draconequus at bay as the unicorns worked in shifts. Their children learned no magic but the barrier spell, and so were better at it even than their parents, and the generation that had grown with the hardship did their job well.
The Earth Ponies too had learned to adapt to the hardship. Grappling with infertile lands and harsh weather, their horticultural technique had strengthened and the food supply had stayed constant, if still dangerously low. Luna had seen firsthand the work ethic of the Earth Ponies, of the dogged spirit with which they strove to triumph over adversity, but she also saw the discontent that spread among them. There were whispers among some peasants that perhaps Equestria had failed them as their ancient homeland had failed them, that they should abandon the land to the Draconequus, or that they should begin fending for themselves and no longer help the other tribes, although the vigorous spirit with which Radishred led his people meant that these whispers remained in the shadows.
If the earth ponies were still holding elections, the spirit of discontent might have gained traction, but earth pony politics was nothing if not very tedious and time-consuming, as the political landscape was riddled with formalized factions, each of whom had to have internal elections to put forth candidates, who then went on to win seats in Congress, and within Congress elections were held for the Chancery. With everypony needed working as hard as possible to extract food from the hostile land, elections were impossible, and so Radishred had maintained a 20-year regime, when he originally was supposed to be up for only 6 years. He was now well into middle age, as was Queen Amethyst, both of whom had only recently started their families when the crisis began. Gale Force was ten years younger than either, and she was now well into maturity, though not showing the signs of age that the other leaders were.
For the most part, it was business as usual for the Triumvirate, focused mostly upon discussing the discontent that reigned amongst their subjects, while remarking that discipline had not degraded to the point that anypony was doing anything about it. Compassion was a strong force within the tribes, and although the tribes largely regarded themselves as separate still, the lessons of the Founding Heroines were well-engrained enough that the tribes would not fight each other. The greatest threat to harmony seemed to be a faction amongst the Pegasus Knights, younger and ignorant of the danger, who were demanding a head-on assault against the Draconequus. The older officers, however, who remembered the failure of such attempts, managed to keep that sentiment from gaining traction.
The last point of every meeting since the crisis had started involved a report from the scholars of the Magic Academy, generally to report merely upon the passage of time, the progress of the Alicorn Princesses, or other matters relating to the struggle against the Draconequus. “Let her in,” Queen Amethyst said to the pair of Unicorn guards who stood at the chamber’s door. The doors swung open, and Wishwell the Wise entered. Her aging had proceeded apace in the last four years, and now she was unable to get out of bed, at least under her physical power. Her own mattress, ensconced in the blue aura of her magic, floated into the room. Her mental and magical faculties were still were still sharp, as was her hearing, but as for everything else…
The bed floated forward, eventually bumping into the triangular council table. “Confounded…” she grumbled. “Can’t see a thing anymore.”
“You’re fine,” Amethyst said gently. “Set it down.”
The mattress fell to the floor as Wishwell sat up.
“It is rare to see you for these reports,” Commander Gale said, “I am glad to see you’re still well.”
“I ain’t well,” Wishwell said. “Really I don’t know how I’m still kickin’.”
“I don’t see any kickin’,” Radishred snorted.
Wishwell glared in his general direction. “Earthies still can’t take a figure of speech,” she grunted. Radishred’s face reddened, but he said nothing.
“Your report,” Gale said shortly. The others present all looked at her, for there had been an air of authority in the Pegasus’ voice that seemed strange to those present, a new tone of voice coming from the Pegasus after knowing her for over 17 years. Amethyst and Radishred glanced at each other.
“It has been 18 years, 2 months, 21 days since the Draconequus emerged and disrupted the Count of Time,” Wishwell began. “We issued a report some days ago to Princess Luna regarding passage of her twelfth birthday, and that’s why I’m speaking here personally. It was not long after her twelfth birthday that Princess Celestia gained her Cutie Mark and first harnessed her power over the Sun. Since siblings tend to get Cutie Marks at similar times, Luna will likely get hers soon as well.”
“We know the plan,” Radishred said. “Then we send Luna up to learn warfare with the Pegasi as Celestia comes to help us in Coltsdam.”
“Well, we may need to keep them together more after Luna gets her Cutie Mark,” Wishwell said. “Because of the Elements of Harmony.”
“What do you mean?” Amethyst asked. “You’ve called the Princesses “the Elements” before, but I thought that was because they were born of Harmony. Are there actual, separate Elements?”
“I’m an old, old mare,” Wishwell replied. “But even if I were young, we’re gettin’ way out into murky depths of magical theory. I mean, nopony’s ever created another pony by magic before. Starswirl the Bearded crafted spells for the quickening of new life, and there is an ancient discipline of transmogrification spells for changing the nature of things, even unto changing species. It was theoretically possible, but Celestia and Luna were the first magic-made ponies, and…”
“Your point?” Radishred said, stamping a fore-hoof on the table impatiently.
“I warned you I was old, didn’t I?” Wishwell snapped. “The original point was that this whole Project Harmony thing is kind of cutting-edge in terms of magical theory. The other scholars and me have been debating what will occur, and we know first off that the Alicorns are more powerful than other ponies.”
“Obviously,” Radishred snorted. “That’s why I’ll be sad to see Luna go. She’s got unicorn magic working with earth pony know-how, and she works about as hard as you could expect a blank-flank filly.”
“Luna was always adept at magic,” Amethyst added. “She always worked hard to try and out-do Celestia in magic, so she was always learning all sorts of spells when she was little.”
“Celestia has been an exemplary apprentice knight,” Gale added. “It’s been very inspiring for the troops to see her in action.”
“Now who’s getting off-point?” Wishwell wheezed. “They’re supposed to be powerful; they’re our only hope against the might of the Draconequus. But the powers they’ve exhibited so far, even Celestia’s ability to control the sun, aren’t the power that they’ll use to stop Discord. Their power lies in Harmony, in the bond that exists between them as sisters who were forged from Harmony itself. They are the Elements of Harmony, but the power of the elements has not made itself manifest yet. We believe that this will happen when Luna gains her Cutie Mark, for at that point both sisters will have their full abilities, and with the bond between them, their powers will join and intensify and form the Elements. There should be some visible sign of this, an outward manifestation of their powers, tokens of the Elements themselves that they will bear. What they’ll be I cannot say.”
“But you made them,” Gale interjected.
“I made them, but I didn’t choose what they looked like. Their forms were chosen, though how I cannot say.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Radishred asked.
“Off-point,” Wishwell said dismissively. “As far as the fight against Discord is concerned, it is enough to know that their full powers will soon manifest, and then they should be brought together occasionally to try harnessing that power, before they are fully ready to fulfill their duty.”
“So there you have it,” Radishred said, finishing his account of the Triumvirate’s council. “Nothing you should really worry about.”
“I should totally worry about it!” Luna yelped. “They’re waiting for me to get my Cutie Mark!”
“Exactly,” Sour Grapes replied. “Nothing you can worry about. No force in this world is gonna make you get your Cutie Mark any sooner than you’re supposed to.”
“But the sooner I get it, the sooner we can start preparing to save everypony!”
“I can’t say I don’t sympathize,” Radishred said. “You’ve got a real fighting spirit in you, and usually it’s a good thing to try to push for what you want, no matter who stands in your way, but this isn’t one of those things. You can’t rush it.”
“I can try,” Luna said stubbornly.
“I’ll help ya,” Beet Red piped up, before everypony present turned to look at her. “I mean, I want to get my Cutie Mark too,” she added, blushing.
“As long as it doesn’t get in the way of your field work,” Sour Grapes said. “You two can do whatever you want. But I’m telling you both, it’s a waste of time.”
In the foolishness of foalhood, however, Luna and Beet Red ignored their parents’ advice. “I’m not going to give up,” she said. The two of them had ventured out to the dam on the Neighagara River. The sun was still in the sky, still circling rapidly around the noon-point: high time for it to be taken down. Luna and Beet Red enjoyed spending time out on the dam, it was their place to go when they wanted privacy from Beet Red’s parents, to play in the odd time that they had for play, given all the work that needed done for the feeding of all of Equestria. Luna floated along at Beet Red’s side, for out here there were no other ponies staring at her and making odd comments. “So how do we do it?” Beet Red asked.
“Well, my Cutie Mark should appear like Big Sis’s did,” Luna said thoughtfully. “It was nighttime, we were sleeping, and all of a sudden there was this light, then she raised the sun, the moon disappeared, and her Cutie Mark appeared.”
“So… you need to be asleep?” Beet Red asked.
“Maybe,” Luna said. “I think it had more to do with the time. The sun appears at the end of the night, and the moon appears at the end of the day. I think I just need to try setting the sun and raising the moon at the end of the day.”
“But how do you do that?” Beet Red asked. “Nopony knows when the day’s supposed to end anymore. It just... ends.”
“How about when ponies are tired? Celestia woke everyone up when she raised the sun, so maybe I’m supposed to raise the moon when everyone wants to sleep.”
“That’s worth a shot,” Beet Red said. “At least you’ve got a better idea of things than I do.”
“Well what age was Redvine when he got his Cutie Mark?”
“10?” Beet Red said questioningly. “Nopony’s sure anymore, but that sounds right. Means I’m already behind him…” she said, blushing.
“But you’re different than he is,” Luna assured. “He’s 100% Radishred’s son.”
“I’m an earth pony, daughter of the Chancellor, and I’m named after a crop,” Beet Red said. “What are the chances that my cutie mark isn’t going to involve me being a farmer?”
“It doesn’t help that we have to do a lot of farming, to keep everypony from starving…” Luna trailed off, the sobering reality of her burden beginning to come back to her.
“Maybe I can get my Cutie Mark by helping you get yours,” Beet Red said. “That’s definitely something I want to do.”
“Good, then let’s get to…” the sun disappeared from the sky, while a sickle moon shot up on the southern horizon. Shocked, Luna and Beet Red both looked at Luna’s flank in the wan moonlight; still bare. “Darnit.”
A few weeks passed by, as the Princess and the First Daughter spent all of their free time out in the fields chasing the sun, waiting for the prime moment for it to set. Luna developed trouble sleeping, spending nights at her window gazing out at the moon, silently willing it to move onto its correct course and into its correct phase. While she like most every other pony in the land could not measure the passage of time, when she really tried, she could feel what time it should have been, were all the world correct. She took that for a good sign, and Beet Red agreed.
One day, the two were out repairing a small rope suspension bridge that stood over an irrigation trough, allowing carts to pass from one field to the next. The sun shone in the West as it ascended into the sky, while black clouds threatened from the East. “Looks like a nasty storm,” Beet Red observed.
“Maybe I’ll see Celestia again,” Luna said. The bridge repair work was a simple enough task, especially with an Alicorn about: Luna magically suspended the planks while Beet Red cut a length of rope from a long coil the two had brought out with them, then bound lengths of rope together and threaded them through the planks.
“That was really worth the trip out here,” Beet Red said, with a sardonic tone that would have made her father proud.
“I can give you a lift back,” Luna offered. Among other talents, Luna was larger and stronger than most everypony her age, including Beet Red. She had flown Beet Red before, and flown the other pony by magic as well. She lacked many technical skills as a flyer yet, but she had, at last, mastered the basics.
“Nah,” Beet Red refused, blushing. “Once you get your Cutie Mark, you’ll be off with the Pegasi and I’ll have to get used to hoofin’ it.”
“Are you sure?” Luna said, spreading her wings.
Suddenly a fierce wind kicked up, blasting up the tilled earth and forcing both ponies to shut their eyes. “Whoa!” Luna exclaimed. Before either could react, a second powerful gust caught Luna’s outstretched wings and sent her flying.
“Luna!” Beet Red shouted.
“It’s okay!” Luna yelled back over the howl of the wind as she stabilized and began to fly against it, some 20 feet up. “I… agh!” she was cut off as an egg came flying out of the clouds and struck her flank, throwing her off kilter and tumbling into the gale as she flapped frantically, trying to stabilize.
Eggs came flying thick and fast after that, chicken eggs, though without whites or yolks, shattering into empty shells as they hit the fields. “Hold on!” Beet Red yelled, struggling to remain steady on her own four hooves. She grabbed up the length of rope they had brought with them, hastily making it into a lasso. The filly swiftly took aim and cast the lasso, half-holding it in her teeth as she let the wind carry it to Luna, who was struggling to stay in place. The loop slipped neatly around Luna’s body, then Beet Red drew the rope back, catching Luna firmly.
“I’ve got you!” she said, straining as the wind attempted to whip Luna away into the West and carry the earth pony off with her. The sky was now fully dark as the clouds rapidly overtook the Western horizon and the dust from the fields swirled with the falling eggs. Beet Red dug in her hooves as she tugged the rope towards one of the thick wooden posts that marked the edge of the rope bridge. She took a few steps tentatively past the post, threading the rope around the post. Somehow, she managed to tie a knot, hitching the rope fast to the post, and Luna stabilized as she was tugged around the sky.
Beet Red had to use her hooves to finish tightening the knot when the wind finally caught her smaller body and threw the filly off into the air. “Red! Red!” Luna shouted, struggling in place, bound by Beet Red’s solid rope-work, though she was unable to see where her friend went in the chaos. Darkness descended further, punctuated only by intermittent flashes of lightning as the storm raged, dying out some minutes later.
The lightning receded westward and the stars came out, the sun having vanished behind the cover of the storm, but the starlight was not enough to illuminate the vast fields. Luna landed, then undid the rope magically. “Red?” she called into the darkness, then leapt back into the air. “Red?” She flew westward, sweeping back and forth, her eyes strained on the ground as she called. “Red? Where are you?”
Luna suppressed a rising sense of panic; it had all happened so fast. The storm had swept up on them so rapidly, and just as quick, her friend was gone, impossible to find in the dark. It would take a long time for searchers to come out this far with lanterns, and who knows what could happen to her by then? She needed light now. Luna lit her horn, but it was insufficient: not bright enough to cast shadows or illuminate all of the fields. “Need more light…” she said, “come on, come on!” She focused on her horn, straining for more power, more illumination. Midnight-blue aura swirled around her horn as a point of silver light built at its tip, then with a “yipe!” the power surged forth, a burst of silvery light that flowed out in a ring, lighting up the entire landscape, all the fields as far off as Coltsdam. Then Luna’s whole body glowed and began to float under its own power. The light burst anew, then Luna emerged with her Cutie Mark, a blotch of black on her midnight-blue flank with a white crescent moon, which Luna discovered not by looking at her flank, but from the light source from the east that caught her eye, a slowly rising crescent moon, of the same degree as the moon on her flank.
“The moon…” Luna breathed, basking in her achievement for a moment. “Red!” she realized, then dashed off. She spotted Beet Red quickly, a patch of red-brown in an irrigation ditch that stood out in the moonlight. She wouldn’t have stood out so cleanly in the sunlight, her coat being hard to distinguish in the muddy waters, but in the gentle light of the moon, the filly was quickly apparent. She was standing, which was a good sign, though she was smeared with mud.
“Luna!” Beet Red greeted as the Alicorn descended towards her. “That light, the moon, was that…”
“Yes,” Luna replied. “Are you all right?”
“You got your Cutie Mark!” Beet Red exclaimed, ignoring Luna’s question and pointing towards her friend’s flank.
“I guess I did,” Luna said. “Are you sure you’re okay?”
“Yeah. The wind tossed me into the ditch, so it was a pretty soft landing in the mud.”
“Here,” Luna said. Her horn glowed anew and the mud fell off of Beet Red, revealing a lasso emblazoned on her side.
“A lasso…?” Beet Red said. “Well, I guess it isn’t exactly a farming Cutie Mark. At least it’s not a beet.”
“You earned it,” Luna said. “That rope trick you pulled was amaz-“ she was cut off as she began to inadvertently slide forward, tugged by some invisible force.
“Luna, what are you…?” Beet Red began.
“I don’t know,” Luna said as she slid another couple of feet forward. “I’m not doing this…” she took wing and began flapping backwards, but she kept moving forwards. Beet Red started trotting after her.
“Where are you going?”
“I don’t know…” Luna said. “I can’t… stop it!” she said, as the mysterious force pulling her intensified, hurling her westward through the air
“Luna!” Beet Red yelled, but the Alicorn was gone.
Beet Red was left looking towards the western horizon, where the departed storm still loomed.
