A teenage Twilight Sparkle asks Princess Celestia a complicated question with a simple answer.

Celestia helps Twilight remember somepony.

Time after time, through chaos and through wars, Princess Celestia prevailed.

Of all the terrible forces she could have fallen to, Flim Flam Industry was the last one anypony had expected.

With thanks to gardrek for editing (3-6) and PinkieDP, Ice Star, and Odd_Sarge for prereading help.

Canterlot lies steeped in chaos, a virulent and deadly plague still boiling away after a decade of suffering. The city, and the ponies in it, still feel the effects, still feel the bite of the times. The lower city, cursed as it is, is mostly partitioned off, leaving each and every pony left stranded and without help. Ponies struggle day by day just to stay alive.

Even as the ponies suffer, politicians toil away, plotting and scheming, machinations rumbling just below the surface. The city is fevered, sick and bloated, ready to pop at any moment. A single pony may be enough to make it all erupt.

And make it erupt Twilight Sparkle shall.

One small step, one lucky break is all she needs to turn the city on its head and take her rightful place by the Queen's side. But even she may not be prepared for the shark tank that is Luna's court.

In the far reaches of Canterlot Castle, high above in the towers lived the archmage. Everypony knew her, yet few had met her.

Twilight Sparkle sighed, having teleported away another noble seeking favors before reaching the top of the stairs for the second time today. They never learned. As the archmage, she already dealt with political squabbles far too often without inviting them into her home. Aside from personal favors for Celestia, she did what was required of her position and then returned to seclusion and research.

The nobility grumbled that no archmage should be a commoner, and Twilight’s disrespect toward them proved it. Each and every time they were forced to bow to her, they hated what they saw: the position, the status, the deference.

Was she not powerful? Was she not great?

Twilight, now reading through dusty scrolls and long forgotten tales, wrote in her notes — notes gathering dust of their own. A brief thought flashed through her mind.

Am I not powerful? Am I not great?

And then Twilight picked up The Tale of the Royal Pony Sisters.

Defunct side stories told in Across the Boundary. They can still provide a little context, but when in doubt, the main story here is canon.

Cover art provided by Lafiir

Changelings and ponies had always been natural enemies of each other, especially with the crystal ponies when they were around. Why wouldn't they be? Changelings were like parasites, feeding off the love that ponies gave off and driving them to illness.

However, Changelings had begun to decline. What started out with as seven hives have diminished down into three, all of which had gone into hiding so well that most ponies didn't know what changelings even were. Even Celestia had not seen one for quite a while, a long feat for an immortal pony.

Until she found a nymph. A new Changeling Queen.

Unable to find it within herself to abandon the changeling, Celestia ends up taking the nymph back to Canterlot under guise as Twilight Sparkle. The plan was simple; find the hive that Twilight belonged to and return her back to be raised with her race.

Of course, despite everything she learned through her long life, she had forgotten that things were never that simple.

For starters, she did not anticipate herself to grow fond of Twilight as time began to pass, or to beam in happiness when Twilight began to refer to her as mom.

Many Many Thanks to my Pre-Readers: Rewrite and Doctor Disco (Welcome to the Team Doctor!)

With her knowledge of time spells enabling Twilight Sparkle to travel into the far future of Equestria, she contemplates all she has seen, and reveals the true reason for her journey.

My name is Twilight Sparkle, and I am a wraith.

A comment driven story following an alternate universe where Twilight is hundreds of years old, Sunset stayed Celestia's pupil, and everyone has the hots for Twaith. Okay, almost everyone. Lets see where this goes!

Teen Sex because of expectations of the internet... and myself.

Join the Twaithverse here!

Thank you to TheStarsOfPines for the current cover art.

Here is the original, confusing, cover art.
Here is the second cover art that had been used.
The third! Done by the same as the current.

Twilight is an astonishing child, with both talent and genius. However, she has her own special problems. Problems involving memory and ponies. This makes her quite a handful for foalsitters.

Enter Princess Foalsitting services! Guaranteed skill and quality, for those little problem children! But is Twilight too much for a genuine princess to handle?

Caution: Adorbs Abound.

This story is a sequel to Clean Slates

Twilight Sparkle: Brilliant, Powerful, Sociable, the very model of the modern major unicorn. She, however, has a poorly kept secret. Her memory for everything non academic is terrible!

Caution: Contains adorable young twilight.

Shoutouts and mad props to Georg's "The monster in the twilight" and Commander x5's "Twiny" series for inspiring this.

I need a Smart Pants tag.