It was during the time when the sun had just been touching the peaks of the highest mountains of Equestria that everyone felt something was wrong. At first, nopony had noticed the falling star that had crashed from the sky toward Princess Twilight Sparkle’s back yard, but, as the routine begin to set in, all the unicorns felt an alien pulse of magic course through them. Twilight, who had woken up to check on the rock, felt something trickling from her nose, and, to her shock, it was blood. Immediately, she called on Princess Celestia as she cleaned her muzzle.
Princess Celestia accepted on her favorite former student’s call and used her magic to travel towards Twilight’s castle and to Twilight’s room, where the Princess of Friendship waited. Twilight silently nodded to Celestia who faced towards her backyard. Preserving their mana for possible attacks, both princesses walked to the rock just to find a doorway. Stepping inside, they saw the origin of the strange pulse.
Blake, John, and Carl were panicking. One, because their friend had an unusually high fever and two, they were scared about Lily and her life. They felt something was wrong after an ancient pulse of wind came from her friend. Little did they know, it had opened the doors of their stasis chambers, and, on their backs, were two alicorn princesses who could only gasp.
Both parties were too busy to notice each other as they watched Lily, whose skin were paler than her natural color, and was coughing as she attempted to breathe naturally, having trouble moving at all.
“Quick,” Princess Celestia instructed Twilight, “get a nurse. I think I can handle this.”
Blake looked back and nearly jumped, but then noticed that she might help. “Hey, boys, I think she can help us,” she told them.
“Who?” John glanced at her, then to the uninvited guests which caused him to yelp, then returns his view to Lily. “Okay, maybe. How?”
Princess Celestia walked closer to Lily. “I have a theory, but, because it’s been so long since I’ve seen a human, I may be missing a few terms on how I should… why are you looking at me like that?”
“We’re kids. Deal with it,” Carl stated. “Also, it’s because you’re, like, really tall, and… what do you mean? How long have we been asleep? Also, why can’t I recognize anything?”
Lily blinked and slowly sat up. “Huh?”
Everyone looked at her and gaped because her sickness had suddenly vanished like magic. Lily looked at Celestia with complete amazement, and hopped up from her bed, and the humans relaxed as Lily walked closer.
“So soft!” Lily commented as she touched Celestia’s leg.
“Wow, really soft!” she reacted as she climbed up Celestia’s back. “Look, feathers!” She pulled out a feather, causing Celestia to flinch.
“Ohmygoshthis. Is. So. Cool!” Lily added as she let Celestia's mane brush her fingers. “Ooh, a gold tiara!”
Twilight, who had been inspecting the architectural designs of the stasis chamber, jumped and hurriedly tried to remove Lily from her former mentor as the curious girl reached for Celestia’s tiara. However, Blake stopped Lily first by calling her for breakfast. Twilight was left gaping as she saw the children walk toward a corner near the window and begin to eat breakfast. Celestia found their eating antics amusing. Twilight noticed this.
“Celestia,” she began. “Why are you amused? One of them tried to take your crown.”
“Yes, because she is young,” Celestia explained. “Young and curious. How she managed to climb my back is peculiar, however.”
“Yeah, she’s like a mixture of Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy,” Twilight commented, “though they look like they’ve been trained.”
“They are, remember?” On Twilight’s confusion, Celestia elaborated. “Yesterday, I had asked about them. You and Rainbow Dash left to check Ponyville and never returned.”
“Oh, right. You did say to go back to our business, and we were having a picnic.” Twilight pulled up something. “I saw this metal panel, but I don’t understand what it says. I could go away and formulate a translation spell, but it would take days.”
Celestia saw the panel and translated. “‘This plate certifies that the settlement, New Exodus Division Base 33 Building 01, is space-worthy and in a position to evacuate…’” Celestia stopped and took the panel closer to her eye. “‘In accordance of… signed by the Sorcerer of Lufera, President of Yeltor Enterprises, President of the United States of America on the year of the Lord, 21st day of June 2140.’”
Twilight frowned. “What?”
“Twilight, what’s the current date?” Celestia inquired.
“Oh, it’s the third Thursday of the sixth month, 2010 AU. Why?” Twilight wondered. It seemed like she was discovering something before ponies came!
“Two thousand and ten years after Equestria founded, which makes it about one thousand and fifty-one years ago when Equus was fully formed—”
“Wait, how did exactly did Equus form?” Twilight asked.
“Long story, involves Equestrian land being placed on their planet’s ocean and the dimensional rift expanding to take over the whole planet. Now, where was I… oh, a thousand and fifty-one years,” Celestia answered and calculated, “and the last human year was 2499, and if I am correct, and if truly am correct, the current human year must be… 2,500 plus the 1,050 years of Equus… This year must be the Human Year 3550. Now, if they said that during the year 2142 that New Exodus Division has been rumored to depart for unknown reasons, then that means the humans have slept here for a thousand and forty-eight years. Wow, and, yet, they’re still alive, without my help in the first place! Amazing!”
“...what?” Twilight, for the first time, didn’t understand a single thing the solar princess just babbled. She winced, considering her friends had the same reaction when she goes science, and now she had just understood why.
“The children,” Celestia clarified, “just woke up from a thousand and forty-eight-year sleep, yesterday, and what was amazing is that humans have magic!”
“Yeah, you said they didn’t when we headed over to the legends section of my studies.” She blinked. “You said sorcerer. Aren’t those like dark unicorns who can cast curses?” Twilight guessed.
Celestia closed her eyes and curled her lips. “That is what I told them, for human legends are rather vague about magic,” Celestia answered. Her eyes immediately shot open as she stared at the girl that had climbed on her. “...and we have one in our midst.”
“Really? Who?” Twilight looked at the group who were having canned fruits for breakfast, which was illogical, unless something or someone in space made fruits. “Is it the one with the black hair?”
“No, it’s the girl with the brown hair,” Celestia whispered. “She has magic.”
“She doesn’t seem to know,” Twilight noted.
Celestia nodded before she overheard one of the children speak the girl’s name. “Lily… Twilight, didn’t you wanted to have a foal named Lily?”
“Twinkling Lily,” Twilight corrected. “What are you suggesting, Celestia?”
“I am suggesting that you should let these humans get adopted by pony families,” Celestia began, “while you would take Lily. I would check in often, and, if we can, we will have to teach this young child about the world of magic. Once we have learned what this ‘New Exodus Division’ plans to do with their little offshoot of humanity, we will have to hope that they are not interested in an invasion.”
“Like… barbarians?” Blake asked, interrupting their conversation, apparently listening in. “Oh, please, we don’t do that anymore, like we’re going just to throw a bomb and then stick a flag in the dirt. But, then, they might try to clean out a forest then start to expand from there. And we might- okay, maybe like advanced versions of barbarians that have ordered formations and weapons that can hit enemies very far…”
“You… you humans kill,” Twilight realized in horror.
“No, we don’t!” Lily corrected. “My dad said killing is bad! I wanna hug them! Make friends! I wanna make friends with everybody!”
Celestia and Twilight Sparkle were dumbstruck by the sudden courage and the undeniable truth Lily had told them about herself. Twilight was beginning to like her.
“I wish my mom and dad were here,” she whispered just to herself, immediately wiping the tear that had formed in her eye. “They would’ve liked what I said.”
Unfortunately, Celestia caught what she said and started tearing up, understanding what she meant. Twilight didn’t, which caused Celestia to recover and approach Lily. Celestia carefully thought about what to say as she crouched down and wiped tears that caused the other children to freeze in confusion.
“You know, you can see her castle,” Celestia told her, surprising Twilight. “You, and all your friends.”
Lily looked up and locked eyed with Celestia.
“We have food better than canned goods,” she added. “I also have cake. Lots of cake.”
“Really?” Lily clarified. “Do you have cakes with sweet decorations?”
“We do, indeed. Isn’t that right, Princess Twilight Sparkle?” Celestia announced.
Twilight flinched and immediately saw the girls’ surprise. “Yes, yes we do! I know a baker who can make a hundred-layer cake for all of us!” she sputtered.
“Being a pony princess myself, I suppose you all can ride on my back, too,” Celestia declared.
Twilight’s eyes bulged out of shock hearing that from her former mentor. The other kids simply but respectfully denied the invitation but Lily had other ideas.
“Really? You’re a pony princess!? Can we go to your castle!? Can I ride on you?!” Lily requested.
Celestia merely giggled as she extended her wing. “Unfortunately, we cannot head to my castle, but her castle is nearby. Hop on, my little child.”
Lily giggled as she began to climb to her back only to remember something. “Wait, I need to get Jj and my dad’s stick!” she said.
“Jj?” Carl asked, and his answer came in a muffled meow from a kitten inside Lily’s jumpsuit. “Oh, the cat.”
Celestia merely raised an eyebrow before she stood up after the little girl had climbed on her back after returning from her pod where the cat and wand were. Twilight could see the silver wand from Lily’s back and saw how much the rod looked like a unicorn’s horn. Shivering at the thought of humans killing a unicorn and taking its horn for magic, she hurriedly followed after Twilight realized that she was alone in the chamber and the others had left, probably following Celestia and Lily. Before she followed, she thought about adopting the girl.
Heck, she was already jealous that Lily had ridden on her mentor.
Realizing that she was feeling insecure caused her to immediately run out of the chambers and follow Celestia.
“Wow, the castle is amazing!” Lily commented after Twilight and Celestia gave her a tour. Lily was allowed to ride Twilight after a long and rather annoying request and Twilight had to wear a weight-distribution saddle Celestia somehow kept on her fur to keep Lily on her back, then they promised not to call them by their royalty in return.
“Amazingly confusing,” Blake joked. “You really need to place some signs, Twilight.”
“Yeah, you’re right—” Twilight realized something. “Somehow we can understand you now? How did that happen?”
“I think it’s me,” Lily admitted. “I always do weird things when I have my dad’s stick.”
In truth, Celestia had secretly placed a human-exclusive translation spell with the kids in the stasis room, since she’d developed such spell so that she wouldn’t need a translator for all humans who needed to talk to her. She hadn't used it since humans died before her spell was universally compatible, and, by then, it had been locked within her memories.
“Okay, then. So… I was kind of hoping you guys would stay here for a while,” Twilight offered. “At least, until you want to leave. It’s okay if you don’t want to—”
“I wanna stay!” Lily answered, agreeing. “It’s okay if my friends don’t want to, but I will miss all of you. Besides, Twily reminds me of my mom.”
Twilight blushed, but realized that the stasis room was just steps away from the private rooms. She facehooved.
“What is it?” Celestia asked, catching her sudden facehoof.
Twilight shook her head. “Just some realizations that they’re currently just in my backyard.”
“Hey, does the offer still stand? I wanna stay here,” Lily told the ponies with impatience. “Please…”
“You sure, Lily?” Carl asked.
Lily crossed her arms. “I hate sleeping in tents.” Her kitten meowed in sympathy. “I hate sleeping in places where I have been sleeping for a long time, and I hate seeing those pods! They scare me!”
“You will visit us, right?” Blake clarified.
“Of course! I can just go through the back door,” Lily answered.
Like a falling chain of dominoes, everybody facepalmed as they realized how close they were after talking like they will be separated for a very long time.
“So… can I get my other stuff and move to a guest room now?” Lily asked with impatience. “I want to see how soft the bed is.”
“You are quite energetic,” Celestia noticed, “and impatient, too.”
“I dun care. You don't know meh.”
…
...
“Are all humans like this?” Celestia mumbled to the sky. “I wish I don’t meet an adult like her during these times.”
“Hey!”
“I’m sorry, dear child.”