Favorable Alignment

by Ice Star


Chapter 34: Happy Hearth's Warming from the End of the World

Luna:

Sunlight filtering through the window and lighting up the inn's room could only mean one thing: I had forgotten to lower the moon during the dawn, so Celestia had to do it herself, no doubt worrying about me all the while. Eventually, I relented to the bright light and blinked my eyes open, wincing when the morning sunlight proved to be far harsher to the eyes of this mortal guise than I anticipated. Shadows on the walls and the lack of sounds outside, except faint stirring of the wind told me it was still fairly early, and it was unlikely to be more than fifteen minutes past dawn, at the very least. Back in Canterlot, Tia would no doubt being trying to finish her breakfast, worriedly drowning out everything else with coffee at me forgetting to lower the moon before she started her day.

I don't mean to make her worry - I'll be raising the moon come again this evening, of course - but I am sure she shall be fine. There are so many ponies there to watch after her and listen to her when she's in distress. She's loved and adored, surrounded by many whom she could call friend. Time spent around ponies always helped her spirits, where mine would always would fall in such a situation. Ponies made her feel safe, and they cared for her as she cared for them. I couldn't relate to this, but for Tia's sake I tried to understand. I had never truly known any feeling like that for myself since the company of others had never brought me anything like joy or solace...

Except, now I found sompony who brought me more happiness than any everypony's praise or loyalty could ever.

Sombra's forehooves were still wrapped around me, as if he wasn't sure I was really there. I nuzzled his chest, and though I yielded no other reaction except for his continued soft breathing in his undisturbed slumber, I wasn't going to complain.

"Sombra?" I whispered, pawing at his chest with a forehoof.

He grumbled softly, but I couldn't tell if it was anything unintelligible or simply muffled speech.

I prodded him again. "Sombra, it's morning!"

"...Uh?"

"You're awake?" I asked, nuzzling his chest again.

"You stayed with me..."

"Of course I did."

"Luna... you..."

I bit the inside of my cheek. "Is something wrong?" I whisper.

"Heh. No," he whispers back, kissing the top of my head and nuzzling into my mane. "Nothing at all. It's just that... you stayed and you told me that-"

"I love you, Sombra."

Sombra pulls me closer, and I let him. "Gah, it's too early to even be alive and you're telling me the one thing I've always wished you would say..."

I feel Sombra yawn and give him a hug. "It's only around five in the morning, Sombra."

"See my previous statement," he mutters, stroking my mane. I want him to keep talking, so I can feel how his whispers tickle my mane and ears.

"We're going to have to meet Shining and Cadance today so we should-"

"Sleep in? Definitely. I'm all for this plan."

"What about breakfast?"

I heard Sombra snort. "We're broke, and I'm too tired to be shoplifting anything."

"You just want to cuddle with me."

"That is my main objective, yes."

I chuckle and run a hoof down the hem of Sombra's cloak. "And are we supposed to be forgoing our meeting with Shining and Cadance?"

"Of course not, but we'll be better off if we-" Sombra interrupts the middle of his sentence with a heavy yawn. "-wait a while. If you were to mention to our dear old friend Miss Pink One that you and I slept in and skipped breakfast she would be forced by the social obligations she follows to buy us a bigger lunch. Visiting royalty would usually get a discount too, so we could make her purchase a feast for us. Not to mention that the only way we'll be able to track them down without suspicion will be to use my ability to sense their magic."

"You just came up with this plan, I presume?"

"Yes, why?"

"It's genius."

"And so am I."

"I cannot argue with you there," I mumble before relaxing once more and slinking into Sombra's embrace again. Tia may have our entire nation to love her as a motherly icon, but I have somepony far better: I have Sombra, a single pony who loves the both of us for being ourselves, and I wouldn't trade him for any kind of worship or adoration from any crowd, since his honesty and loyalty to me are worth more than any kind fealty that my subjects could offer.

I'm about to close my eyes when I hear Sombra say something. "Hrm? What was that, Sombra?"

"Are you really that tired?" he teases.

"Maybe a little. Was that what you had said?"

"No..."

I snuggle deeper into the fluff of his winter coat. "What was it then?"

"Are you mine?"

"Pardon?"

"You told me that you love me, but do you want us to be together?"

"You are inquiring to if you want to have a formal relationship with me?"

"Yes, Luna..." Sombra mumbles tiredly.

"I wouldn't consider it with anypony but you, Sombra."

...

Sombra seemed to disapprove of almost everything we saw outside today, such as the brightness of the summer sun high in the cloud-free sky over Ponemünde.

First, he expressed mild annoyance with the tacky nature of the modest amounts of wreaths that adorned occasional shops, windows, and doors by shooting each one he saw a glare of disgust.

Next, he grew grumpier with each time Fish tried to stick his head out of Sombra's saddlebags, whiskers twitching. Sombra eventually gave up trying to manage the creature once Fish dared to try and place a paw upon Sombra's cloak - which was disguised like a jacket again - and then dumped Fish onto my wingless back, where he sat for the remainder of our walk around Ponemünde.

Both Sombra and I took joy in pointing out how silly the townsponies were, their cheerful mood affecting all but us. Their good-mornings and Happy Hearth Warmings were like projectiles that passed over the two tourist ponies who only smiled at one another and made eye contact with nopony at all. Sombra could have lit something on fire and not a soul would have noticed - which he half disapproved of and was half amused by.

The fourth thing he despised on Hearth's Warming Day was having to call himself an Equestrian the one time he was asked by somepony who posed the mundane question of where his home country was. Once the Germane native had received the answer she had wanted, Sombra dropped any pretense of curtness.

"Me, an Equestrian! It's ridiculous that anypony would be so stupid to accept that answer. Neither of us are Equestrians. We barely even sound like the horde of idiots that make up the citizens of your bloody pathetic excuse for a nation."

"You pass for Equestrian fairly well."

"I suppose."

"You just need the customary lobotomy, correct?"

"Are you really saying that about your own subjects?"

"I'm trying to make a joke, Sombra. One you would appreciate."

"How do you even know what a lobotomy is? They don't do them anymore."

"I grew up in the Tribal Era too. Starswirl strongly advocated the philosophy that only unicorns needed brains and that earth ponies should be 'relieved' of them. Since I am an Alicorn, and neither a earth pony or a unicorn... and one who never obeyed him, Starswirl would have gotten farther in his attempts to lobotomize me when I was much younger if it weren't for Tia."

Sombra tried to suppress a growl, but only managed to make it quieter, hissing his words through gritted teeth. "He tried to do that to you? As a filly?!"

"I'm here now, Sombra. Nopony is going to hurt me anymore."

"Especially not with me around."

I brush closer to Sombra, my steps gliding across the cobbled streets. "I won't let anypony hurt you either."

Seeing Sombra smile was the best gift I received that day and the image of it stuck with me throughout the rest of our walk to find Shining Armor and Cadance. Even when we were counting seagulls or Sombra stopped to try and teach me a few bits of Germane from a sign, I still wanted to see him smile again. I knew I was smitten with Sombra, and had been for a while... but I hadn't known I was smitten with his smile as well.

There was nothing I could put past him, Sombra's mind and reflexes were sharper than any pony I had ever known. He could keep up with all my eccentricities. He could understand things I couldn't always bring myself to say. He saw time as it was: something that could never be bent to the will of any mortal; a vast sea none could tame and a blank page for an immortal soul to map. His wit always had me laughing or thinking and he noticed many things that even I might overlook.

He knew I wanted to see him smile again. He was waiting, I suspect, for some pleasing timing in order to surprise me with something more than the creeping smirk I caught glimpses of now.

We continued to play silent games with one another, quietly pointing out sights for one another to see, letting our expressions be the only comment we give. Other times, I would pull him down some lonely looking street to see what might lie along them and we would peer into forgotten shops with mostly-drawn curtains and ponder lots of little things in silence...

Who owns them? What could some of them be for? What might be the cause for the lack of patronage? How old might that teapot in the window be? Would Sombra drink tea? What might the title of that book be? If this was a secondhoof item shop, then who owned the book last? What oddly pretentious name would describe the color of the wallpaper?

...and eventually Sombra would nudge me in a silent reminder that it was almost one o' clock and we should be going even if I wanted to drag him under one more sprig of mistletoe of the dozens hanging around Ponemünde.

In retaliation, I would sneak flowers into his mane, gathering them from clumps in window boxes and other locations hiding from the sea breezes that wafted by and then watching Sombra pull them out, making a sound somewhere between a snort and a sigh before he made them combust in brilliant bursts of different colored sparks for us both to watch.

It was my job to be a princess, and while I did not like the disguise I had to don I did like the distance between myself and ponies when I could walk among them and still feel as alone as ever with an ever-expanding sea of alienation that only reveals how detached I am from mortals compared to my sister. Right now, they feel like pastoral paintings of dandelion fluff... very real, very fleeting, but not really here. Ponies can cease to feel real after a while, yet they think that somehow, on maybe a level or two - but only the ones that aren't really there - that I'm the same as them.

Perhaps that's one reason that meeting Sombra was so horrifying. He had never felt like that. Everything he did, and still continues to do is bold and trademark... and utterly unforgettable as a result. The same distance that I do not mind driven between myself and mortals serves only to bring Sombra and I together and I knew that if I ever needed to close that gap, just for a little while, then Sombra is the anchor I can count on to bring me all the way back from wherever I have been.

"They're going to be right around this corner," Sombra says, finally breaking the silence between us and nodding to the edge of a row of brick townhouses where something lies beyond: our meeting place with Shining and Cadance.

I nod, and watch Sombra's knowing smirk emerge when he sees the location that has been selected by Cadance and Shining Armor that has caused Sombra's eyes to reflect great amusement, and even excitement.

It's a restaurant... but the giant, illustrated sign makes its focus clear...

...This eatery appears to have a focus on pizza.

...

After a few quick hellos were exchanged between Cadance, Shining Armor, and myself the reserved room that they had been occupying for the late morning became the victim of Sombra's 'there can never be too much pizza' attitude and my voracious appetite. The large table in a once pristine, quiet room was no longer home to the quietly discarded plates from the soup and pizza that Cadance and Shining Armor had, both sets of dinnerware quietly adding up to an almost meager stack even when the two wineglasses Cadance had used were taken into account.

None were prepared for what Sombra and I would unleash. The birds twittering outside and the soft melody of the peaceful breeze didn't match the brutal scene unfolding in the cafe.

Three large garden salads - one of which had been flooded with a sea of dressing - had already disappeared when placed in front of me along with half a dozen plates of crackers and three bowls of soup - two small one medium. Since Cadance had commented on the wine being quite exquisite here, I had agreed to have a small glass. Or four. It was better than what Cadance had said for such a common establishment and since Cadance had finished her meal before Sombra and I arrived she took the time to explain that Alicorns like Tia and are were not like ponies in terms of how much we ate - or how difficult we were to intoxicate.

His only response was to nod dully, politely hiding as many traces of horror as he could and refusing dessert while I looked longingly at the sandwiches advertised in the menu. How could such culinary beauties be so far in the back of the advertisement while images of the plentiful and tempting salad bar took up a page and a half? It was truly an injustice to spotlight fruit pies while forgetting that sandwiches are a most outstanding modern convenience.

"Auntie Luna, are you still hungry?" Cadance asked, smiling while I stared at the surprisingly charming and accurate illustrations of various dishes.

"I wouldn't want to drain what little bits you still have-"

"Nonsense!" Cadance said, cheerfully clapping her forehooves together so the gold shoes she wears clink with a pleasing rhythm. "If you want a slice of pie, there's still plenty of bits from Auntie Celestia. Is there a certain flavor you like?"

"Oh, I wasn't looking at the pies. Tia has always been more fond of such confections than I."

Across from my chair, Cadance stared at down at the short frame of my earth pony mare disguise, blinking. "Isn't there anything else you wanted? The bill's going to give us away if news of anything suspicious like the amount ordered reaches Canterlot, but that'll take a few days, especially now that it's Hearth's Warming..."

I meet her mock-smirk with a small smile of my own, so different from the one I gave to Sombra. A small break in my usually neutral expression, a smile for a friend. "You are trying to guilt trip me into ordering dessert? Oh my, is harboring a fugitive and a runaway not good enough for you that you have resorted to other lowly deeds?"

Cadance holds a gold-shod forehoof to her chest in faux shock. "How could you accuse your favorite niece of taking such actions against you?"

"I would much prefer this over a pie anyway." To show Cadance what I'm referring to, I hold up the menu in my forehooves, turning it to face her so she can see the image of a large sundae drizzled in thick rivers of fudge and dotted with cherries and vanilla chocolate shavings that look like snow falling onto the mint chocolate chip scoops of ice cream. To top off the look of a snow covered hill for Heath's Warming, a pretzel stick dunked in toffee is heavily decorated with green frosting dusted with a light coat of whipped cream in obvious mimicry of a pine tree.

"L-Luna..." Cadance says, no doubt examining the price.

"Is it too much?"

"I can't believe you can eat something like this just once without any consequences."

"I was planning on sharing it."

Cadance laughs. "With who? Sombra doesn't like ice cream and I'm full."

"Maybe we could get it to go?" I quietly offered, however Cadance had already turned to talk to Shining Armor.

"Shiny, dear, do you want any of this dessert Auntie Luna is thinking about getting?"

Shining didn't respond to Cadance's question because he was too busy staring at Sombra with slack-jawed horror, his blue eyes bearing the blankness of one who has been bleached of all emotional experience through many hardships and traumas that have left their soul void of little else but the painful remembrance of the things that they have seen-

Except it was hard to believe that there was much depth to this reaction since he was merely watching Sombra eat.

Sombra, of course, ordered an entire pizza for himself. The cheesy surface was littered with pineapples and green peppers. Two metal cans, their surfaces gleaming with dripping dots of misty precipitation, sat empty of their sugary, soda-pop contents next to the large plate his pizza was served on. Five slices of pizza were expertly stacked on top of one another, separated only by layers of a salad that he had sandwiched between the slices. He didn't need to worry about me trying to steal anymore bits from his salad now that it was at the mercy of the pizza slices and Sombra himself.

"Are you really going to try and eat all that?" Shining Armor whispered, his voice quavering with fear.

Sombra nodded, scoffing at Shining's terror as if he were nothing more than a foal jumping at their own shadow.

"I guess that's a no..." Cadance said, returning her attention to me.

"Indeed."

"There's still enough bits to get this."

"Oh, I won't impose, really-" She cuts me off before I can promise to do something in return for her.

"It's fine, Luna." Cadance smiled. "You could always get it to go. Isn't there an enchanted icebox on your ship?"

I nodded, and Cadance looked around for any staff to call over while I busied myself by focusing elsewhere.

I wasn't sure which was stranger, the fact that Sombra was able to find a way to eat all that pizza or that I think Shining Amror was scarred for life in the process of watching Sombra shift into a small cloud of shadow to engulf his lunch when nopony was looking.

Well, nopony except Shining Armor who couldn't manage to look away...