//------------------------------// // (B'Tween) The Secret Origin of Ponykind // Story: Blaze the Pony Tale // by Wolven5 //------------------------------// In a starry void, empty yet bright, two presences met to discuss new matters. It'd been weeks since the changeling attack and although there was still much healing ahead, the ponies of all involved were holding on together and carrying on with each passing day. There had been numerous funerals for all the ponies and guards who fallen in the line of duty, including the big brother of a certain little video-gaming colt, but his parents and all his friends were there for him. The pain would never go away but time and support would help it hurt less and less. Things are going better than we'd hoped. The Ponies of Equestria are made of stronger stuff than other creatures give them credit for. Yes, and yet it took the actions of only one to bring about so much loss... We will deal with her once the Equestria Games are over, and that's getting to be just around the corner. I'm surprised you didn't postpone or even cancel the games in light of all that's happened. We need to preserve the image of our nation's strength, to discourage outside threats from perceiving weakness. Otherwise we may go through this all over again and for even longer, with higher casualties. We are lucky that this was contained to Canterlot though I still fear what the changelings may yet be capable of, even with their leader incapacitated. As they say, the show, or in this case the Games, must go on. I can understand that, but let's get to why we're here - Twilight... Are you sure the time has come for her to know what you taught me? I do, but I want you to be the one to tell her. Wha- Me?! But-but- I feel this knowledge she must learn may come easier for her to hear it from you, now that the two of you are engaged. As much as I would like to teach her the secret history and origin of ponykind, my recent self-reflections have discouraged me... ...Should I show her the way you showed me? That is up to you. I trust your judgment in this matter, and once you conclude with this lesson, you may inform Twilight she is free to send me any questions she may have and that I will answer them to the best of my abilities. No more secrets. ...No more secrets. The two presences faded from the starry void... and a blue-white light filled up Midnight's workshop at Sweet Apple Acres, and quickly faded away to reveal him standing inside it. The task ahead of him was important, and he took a deep breath before leaving his workshop to find Twilight. "I still can't believe it!!" Earlier, Midnight had come to the library, announcing to Twilight it was time for some new lessons about alicorns, and Twilight automatically gathered a couple saddlebags full of study aids, quills, inkwells, parchment, several textbooks, and so on. She'd almost called Spike but Midnight cut her off, saying this was just between the two of them. As she followed Midnight, Twilight was looking through a few books at the same time, all the while gushing with excitement, "More lessons in alicorn magic! Or-or is it going to be a lecture? If so, I'm glad I brought all these writing utensils and parchment to take notes, do I need to take notes? Well, even if I don't, it's always good to have notes to fall back on. 'Be prepared', those are two words I live by! You know, I'm a little surprised Princess Celestia isn't giving me these lessons, not that I don't object to you teaching me, Midnight! I actually enjoy having you as a teacher. Come to think of it, that I'm with my teacher... makes me feel... a little naughty!" Midnight gave her a look at hat comment and Twilight suddenly feared she'd said something wrong... until Midnight raised his brow and smirked, "Maybe I'll assign my naughty student some extra homework tonight..." Twilight couldn't help but blush and Midnight chuckled, "Come on, we're almost there." "Uh and... yeah, that's the thing," Twilight hurried to keep up, "you didn't say where we're going." "Heh-heh, you'll see," Midnight responded teasingly, Twilight growling in slight irritation. "And we're here," Midnight announced after a couple more minutes of walking. Twilight looked around and saw they were in an open field with nary a soul in sight, Ponyville a fair distance away. She looked to the left and then looked to the right, she looked up to the sky, and down to the ground, and then back at Midnight, who was standing there with a knowing smirk on his face. "Sooooooooooo.... what are we doing way out here?" "Well, for what I have in mind," Midnight bobbed his brows, "we need a little privacy." "Midnight!" Twilight gave him an indignant look while setting her saddlebags down, "I thought you were going to teach me more about alicorns, not trick me into getting some... some nookie!" The blue alicorn chuckled teasingly and said, "First off - You are so cute when you're irritated. Second - I am gonna teach you more about alicorns. We just needed to be somewhere where nopony could see us. Watch this..." Twilight sighed and watched as Midnight closed his eyes, the lines along his horn lighting up... before it unleashed a blinding radiance! Twilight scrunched her eyes shut, feeling a wind blow from everywhere along with a disorienting sensation. To Twilight, it felt oddly similar to standing in the shallows of a beach while the water pulled away, withdrawing from where she stood, feeling as though she were in motion while standing still. And just like that, the light dimmed. Looking around, she found herself in what appeared to be a pine forest in the middle of winter. Soft pure white snow blanketed the ground, frost patterned in fanciful swirls along the tree trunks, and yet she realized that even though she could feel the cold it didn't bother her! "Beautiful, isn't it?" "Eep!" Twilight jumped and sighed to see it was just Midnight, "Oh, uh- Yeah, it... is! Where in Equestria are we?" "Heh, what makes you think this is Equestria?" Midnight teased before he started walking through the forest. "Wah- Hey! Don't just walk away!" Twilight hurried up so she was walking at Midnight's side, "And what do you mean, this isn't Equestriaaaaaa.... oh!" Twilgiht saw that Midnight had led her to a vast snowy clearing edged in evergreen forest, the sky above an alien beauty of softly glowing stars interconnected to reveal constellations and phantom images around them to provide more detail to the cosmic images, a starry nebula slowly flying overhead like an oriental dragon, the moon shaped like the upwards-facing crescent of Midnight's cutie-mark, and in the middle of the clearing was a small hill upon which stood a tall and beautiful rowan tree but its berries were sapphire blue instead of the normal red. Around the base of the tree's trunk and hanging from some of the lower branches were a bunch of random stuff. Of course it was the environment that instigated the dropping of Twilight's jaw, to Midnight's amusement as he stepped over and gently closed Twilight's jaw and spread his foreleg out in a beholding manner, "Welcome to my world!" Twilight shook off the immobilizing state of wonder and gawked at Midnight, "YOUR WORLD?! Wha- I don't... Explain." Chuckling, Midnight gestured Twilight to follow him as he led her towards the hill in the middle of the clearing, "This, Twily, is my Personal Pocket Dimension, tied to our native reality. Every alicorn has one, and its reality is dictated by the whims and desires of the alicorn its existence is tied to. For example..." Midnight reached out with his foreleg and tilted his head over... and it went over his shoulder, landing in Midnight's hoof, causing Twilight to shriek!!! "EEEEEEEEEEEKKKK!!!!" Twilight's mane stood on end at the sight of her fiancé holding his head in his hoof and actually laughing at her reaction - It was the sort of crazy stunt she'd only ever seen Discord-turned-Eris do. Then Midnight's head grew a little larger... and then swallowed his body in one GULP and it appeared right below him as he shrank down to his normal size, still in a fit of giggles. "That is completely twisted and utterly terrifying!!" Twilight yelled angrily as Midnight calmed down. "S-sorry, Twi-hi-hi...!!" Midnight wiped a tear of laughter away, "I-I... Heh, I just wanted to give you a clear and definite example of what I was saying, and I guess following the Master of Chaos's example wasn't perhaps the best one to go by." Twilight gave him a deadpan look, to his worry, until she sighed, "You said... the reality of this dimension is... decided by you?" "Yes, phew!" Midnight was glad she didn't hold his little trick against him, "An Alicorn's Pocket Dimension doesn't work like our native dimension. You might have noticed that the wintry setting here should be really cold, except...?" Midnight gave her a playful look and Twilight realized what he was implying and said, "I feel the cold... but it doesn't bother me!" "You got it," chuckled Midnight as he took a few steps through the snow but none of it clung to his fur and his hoofprints vanished a second or two afterwards. "In these Pocket Dimensions, things like laws of physics or even time don't apply. Here, check this out." Then, to Twilight's amazement, Midnight started walking straight up as though he were taking a simple stroll. She craned her neck to see him walk onward and upward- "Ahem." She looked down... and there he was, giving her a smug look! She looked up and he wasn't in the air anymore, and she couldn't imagine where he could have popped out of since he clearly didn't teleport. "How the hoof did you do that?!" "No laws of physics, Twi. Like I said, reality here is subject to my will, or even my whims," Midnight shrugged like it was no big deal. "This dimension's reality is... Hmm, not quite sure how to say this... Well, not grounded? Like... Kinda like a set of building blocks, or even a sandbox. I can shape it however I want, decided how things work however I want, and when I get bored with it I just knock the blocks over or wash away the sandcastle. The way you see it now is... kinda like a reflection of myself." "This place?" Twilight gazed at the wonder of how this dimension and soon got a vague idea of what Midnight meant. This beautiful wintry scene was soft, relaxing, and calm, the dazzling cosmos above sparked that wondrous feeling of wonder, and she assumed that the elements she was seeing here were things special or appealing to Midnight in some form or manner. "How big is this place?" Twilight wondered aloud. "It's big," Midnight nodded, "but how things look and their nature will surprise you. Despite the way the sky above us looks right now, it doesn't extend into outer space like the sky of our native dimension. My atmosphere eventually fades away and if you go too far in any direction you find yourself coming back here towards the center of it all. Even if you kept going straight in one direction or flying straight up, you find yourself coming back here, even if you never took a turn and you wind up heading down when you thought you were going up. Remember, this isn't an actual world; it's merely pocket dimension attached to the one in which we were born." "Strange..." Twilight was about to take a note... when she realized, "I forgot my study aids!! I can't take notes..." "Here," Midnight waved his hoof, and an entire store with a sign over the door reading 'Study Aids Galore, for all your Studying Needs'. He laughed as Twilight's eyes lit up like a filly during Hearth's Warming Morning. "Help yourself." Twilight squealed with joy and ran in while Midnight waved his hoof again to make a large and plush armchair appear with a coffee table covered with Auntie Spice's Pepper Pony's pizza and some colt cola chilled to perfection and hand a bite as he waited for Twilight complete splurging on herself. Surprisingly, she only took five minutes. "OK!! I am soooo ready for anything you have to show me," Twilight raised a pristine and expertly-primed pegasus quill pen with an inkwell full of the refined and everlasting ink harvested from krakens, levitating a parchment of the finest quality and had stars in her eyes.... that quickly faded by the solemn look on Midnight's face even as he munched on his pizza, took a swig and belched in a rather unprincely manner. "Ahem! Equestria to Midnight, hellooooo!" Sighing, Midnight stood up, the chair and lunch vanishing in a poof of sparkly smoke and he faced Twilight, "Princess Twilight Sparkle. The time... has come!!" "For...?" Twilight hinted for him to keep going. "The secret history of alicorns that led to the origin of this world and of Ponykind," Midnight declared in a deep and weighty manner and Twilight sensed he wasn't joking. "Tell me, Twilight - How old do you think our world is?" "Well, uh... When you... take into question the process of natural selection and even literally hundreds of theories about the formation of a planet-sized object, which of course states by almost every theory can take at least billions of years-" "At least 10,000 years," Midnight interrupted. "HUH?!" Twilight gave Midnight an incredulous look. "Around 50,000 at most," he did a so-&-so gesture with his hoof while giving it a look of consideration. "The point is, our world is a lot younger than you think, and it was not formed naturally over the span of billions of years." "But- I... How could a life-bearing planet inhabited by millions of different organic species come into existence so quickly?!" Twilight asked, her hunger for knowledge suddenly voracious... and all of a sudden the world around her and Midnight vanished! She started to panic a bit until she noticed Midnight was standing there, unconcerned by the fact they his world had suddenly become a blank infinite white. Then... It darkened into a cosmic void of stars unfamiliar to Twilight. Her father had enjoyed teaching Twilight about Astronomy and the names of all the constellations in their sky. Then the starry portrait gave way to reveal a distant sphere with a nearby sun. Twilight watched in awe as the sphere grew closer and closer until she could see it was a lush green crystal blue, and heavenly white, and surrounding it was a swirl of golden dust in the stylized shape of a wing. "Eons ago, long-long before our world was brought into existence, there have been other worlds. Worlds spread far and distant from each other throughout the stars. Other worlds, other stars as infinite as the individual grains of sand in tens of thousands of deserts. This unending reach of starry space is known as the Cosmos... Somewhere within the Cosmos was a world not unlike our own, a world that predates the existence of Earth Ponies, Pegasi, and Unicorns, for before them there had only been one kind of pony, Twilight. The Alicorns!" Twilight watched as the colors of this unfamiliar world spread out like blood mixed with water and surrounded them and through the mist Twilight gasped in utter amazement! She saw a grand city! Shining, resplendent, and advanced! Technological wonders that seemed a blend of science and sorcery and existing in perfect harmony with nature. Towering trees that grew into architectural structures that made the skyscrapers of Manehatten look primitive and ugly, roads of unyielding soil raised by tender roots, creating bridges and platforms, pillars displaying media announcements in the form of softly glowing holograms, airships that flew without gasbags or steam engines, as though unfettered by gravity and inertia, rivers of crystal pure water flowing through the city in intricate canals and even flowing up and over in cascading loop-de-loops, droplets glistening like diamonds, and populating this immaculate society were alicorns! Stallions, mares, foals, young, old, all horned and winged and going about their daily business with smiles of content and eyes relaxed by harmony. "This was Albion, the alicorns' royal capitol and the pride of their society. Here, their brightest and most curious minds studied and persevered to learn and to understand. The Alicorns had come a long way, they'd had their triumphs and their failures, but soon they achieved a society and culture that could only be described... as perfect. They had toiled and researched and experimented in magickal sciences and produced technologies and spells that could only be described as miracles, capable of feats even the most advanced unicorn wizards we have today could never even come close to achieving." All the while Midnight recounted to Twilight this history that Celestia had once shared with him, his dimension brought this history to life before Twilight's very eyes! "In time however, the Alicorns' perfect society... had become too perfect. They achieved their cultural apex as a society and come to a point where there was nothing left to do! Nothing left on their world to discover or explore. Things like world peace or even world hunger had long ago been solved, weapons of mass destruction had long been disarmed and their fabrication forbidden, dark arts of magic made taboo, a balance had been perfected with the world and the consumption of natural resources and all needs were fulfilled. Thus the alicorns fell into a short period of depression and boredom... until an idea was proposed, an idea to explore what they would later call the Final Frontier! "Outer Space... and so, the Alicorns began an initiative to study the concepts of interstellar travel. It was around this time that an alicorn colt was born. This colt was recognized at birth to be an individual of promise, a naturally-born prodigy, and so it was that this colt was named in honor of this recognition - Morning Bright. Growing up, Morning Bright excelled in all subjects. He became popular and even helped his fellow students in subjects and studies and disciplines to improve where they fell short. It was no surprise that Morning Bright graduated valedictorian and top of all his classes." Twilight watched as this Morning Bright was born, grew, learned, excelled, and matured into a young stallion in a matter of minutes. "Upon his graduation though, Morning Bright approached the science division expressing his desire to become a part of the initiative to achieve interstellar travel. He presented his own theories and concepts for a ship capable of traveling among the stars, and although the scientists in charge of the initiative were impressed they dismissed him, reasoning Bright was too young and despite his academic successes he didn't have the certifications to be accepted into such a prestigious project. "He took their rejection personally and swore he would make those pompous eggheads rue the day they spurned his talents and intellect and would one day beg him to lead the initiative. Morning Bright fell into seclusion and no longer mingled with society, turning down multiple job offers as he dived into his own secret research. It was only by happenstance that Morning Bright was exposed and discovered to be experimenting with magical arts so vile and depraved that it was brought to the attention of the alicorn king." Twilight watched as Morning Bright was brought before the king and who must have been his daughter at his side. "Morning Bright, you have been found guilty of experimenting with forbidden arts, magic of the darkest kind, and so I am left with no alternative. Now and forever, you are banished from our nation! Your research and experiments have already been destroyed and you have until sundown to leave this city and never return. Have you anything to say?" Morning Bright glared up defiantly at the king and sneered, "You will all one day regret this... Someday, I'll get my power back! I swear this under a new name, a name that every stallion, every mare, every foal will one day cringe with fear at the very mention of it! So swears I, Morning Blight!!" "Take him away!" the king ordered and his guards escorted the upstart out of his presence. Twilight watched in fear of that young stallion, a promising individual who had fallen into disgrace, merely sneer as he was led out of the city in a walk of shame. There was something about that fallen star that she couldn't help but feel sorry for, as she turned to Midnight who looked on after that disappointment. "Whatever happened to... Morning Blight?" "...The alicorn king's daughter had warned her father they should not have just let him go. But in time, the threat was forgotten by all but the princess as Blight was not heard from in decades, and eventually nopony believed he would ever return. How wrong they were..." The city of Albion suddenly exploded with a fiery destructive light, blinding Twilight, and she gasped in horror once the light faded, revealing the city devastated and bodies lying everywhere. Fires and rubble and debris littered the streets, and the sky was filled with choking smoke and the distant roars of explosions. "From out of nowhere did the Alicorns find themselves at war, threatened by a society of beings they had always considered their neighbors and friendly rivals, the Cat Sidhe..." "The Cat Sidhe?!" Twilight gawked at Midnight, "Isn't that... the name of Catrina's species?!" "The very same. The Cat Sidhe struck without warning and all too quickly did war erupt and burn for many years thence," Midnight nodded gravely as they watched alicorn warriors fight the Cat Sidhe army. "Before long, it was revealed that Morning Blight was the schemer behind this dark pageant of blood and terror. He had gone to the Cat Sidhe, wormed his way into the good graces of their leaders, revealed secrets and knowledge of the alicorns to the Cat Sidhe, including their plans to venture beyond the stars and twisted that revelation to make it seem that the alicorns were planning to use interstellar travel to reap the bounties of resources off world and use them to dominate the whole planet, including the Cat Sidhe. "The war lasted for perhaps a century and as the mounting casualties on both sides grew so did how it ravaged the world upon which it stood. Finally having had enough, the Cat Sidhe used their own magical technology to open a portal and evacuate as many of their remaining numbers to another dimension to flee the alicorns while Blight was finally captured. "During the war, the alicorn king had perished, leaving his daughter to assume the throne. Out of respect of her father and perhaps her own fear of power, she chose not to assume the royal title of 'Queen' and remained a Princess... "Blight was brought to the Princess in chains and after careful deliberation, she passed judgement and declared he would suffer imprisonment for all time! Using a forbidden spell, the Princess tore Blight's soul from his very body, containing his malignant essence within a dark crystal where he would know only pain and loneliness while his body was left to rot so that they would never be reunited. However, Blight's punishment would do nothing for the aftermath of the war..." The images faded, showing the planet no longer beautiful and lush with life, but smoky, barren, and burning. "Their world had been scarred by over a century of war and it was quickly determined that any efforts to restore their world to its former glory would be doomed to failure. It was declared then by the Alicorn Princess that if their world could no longer support them then they would find a new world. She ordered the Alicorns to complete the ship they'd been preparing for interstellar travel, filled it with all they would need, along with any refugees to bring with them, and before long they had set sail through the stars..." The alicorns' ship drifted among the cosmos, and passed by world after world, star after star, a lonely speck wandering aimlessly amongst the darkness of space. "They travelled the universe for years, passing world after world because they none they encountered could support life. but as their supplies began to dwindle, the Princess knew they had to find a life-bearing world soon otherwise they would perish. But then, she was struck with an idea - Instead of finding a new world to call home they would make one! This proved to be far more easier, and before they knew they found a lifeless planet-sized celestial body and knew this would be perfect to serve as the basis of their new world. The Princess used her magic to pull a nearby star close by and took the cosmic dust of a shimmering nebula and coalesced it into a silvery sphere, creating for their new world its own sun and a moon. "They used their magic technology to terraform the world to suit their needs, giving it atmosphere, water, and then seeding it so as to cover it with plant life to provide oxygen. They released all the animal specimens they'd brought with them, and the Princess gave some of them the spark of awareness before sending them on their way, along with the refugees of other sentient creatures the alicorns had granted refuge on the ship. "The alicorns had succeeded! They'd created a new world where they could make a new start... until they realized they had another dilemma. After everything they'd been through, all that they'd suffered and lost, the alicorns were on the brink of extinction! They'd expended all their major resources to build this ship, travel the stars, create this new world, and now this? They considered the issue at long lengths, ideas on how to preserve their race were shot down one after another before they finally faced the bitter truth - Any efforts to repopulate would fail, they would die out too quickly, and the alicorn race would cease to exist... "The Princess thought long and hard on how she could save her people... until she came up with a solution. It was unorthodox solution, a desperate one in fact! But she saw no other way..." When Midnight stopped talking, Twilight looked at him wondering why... until she watched as the Alicorn Princess flew up to a high vantage point, overlooking all her remaining subjects resting in a meadow. They slept, tired, weary, some sick, some hungry. They had suffered enough but one way or another their legacy had to continue. Then, the Princess lit up her horn and a spell of inconceivable power was cast. From her horn did unravel threads of the purest magic that rose up and wove together into an ethereal blanket that expanded as it ever so gently floated down, covering every single alicorn but the princess. The lavender alicorn watched in amazement as the form of each alicorn under that blanket shined through... and then each form was divided into three! The blanket faded away like a shimmering vapor to reveal each alicorn was now separated into three forms. One with the horn, one with wings, and one with neither. The incredible truth soon dawned upon Twilight's face as she realized the truth! It was either that or the most wild pony tale she'd ever been told, and yet... "Do you see now, Twilight?" Twilight looked at Midnight who gazed upon these ponies as they began to wake up, blissfully unaware of the selves they had been prior. "I had the same look when Princess Celestia showed this truth to me when I was eighteen... Every earth pony, pegasus, and unicorn who lives today are descended from these ponies you see before you, these ponies who had originally been something more. This is the origin of ponykind." "I-I... I don't even know what to say!" Twilight wracked her brain at all that she'd just learned, barely able to comprehend it all. "Well, when these ponies woke up, they didn't recall their previous existences as alicorns," Midnight decided to wrap this up, "the Princess descended down to them, and named the ponies bearing the horns Unicorns, and they would light the way. She named the winged ponies Pegasi, that they would watch over their fellow pony, and she named the ponies without wings or horns Earth Ponies, and bade them to feel the connection to the earth beneath their hooves so as to shoulder their fellow pony's heavy burdens. "They were the first of their kinds, her legacy and bade them to do as they wish, go their own ways, to make the world their own, and promised she would watch over them always. Afterwards, the Alicorn Princess destroyed the ship and all but one record of the Alicorns' history in the hopes that one day her people born anew would be able to remember what they had once been and carve their own marks of greatness. "The Princess made more preparations for her little ponies to be certain that they would have the necessary tools and knowledge to one day build their own society and be prepared for the challenges they would surely face, until finally... she disappeared." Twilight looked at Midnight again but he spoke further, knowing what she intended to ask. "Nopony knows what became of her but she is remembered as the writer of our stories, the architect of our past, our present, and our future. "She is remembered... as Princess Faust." The images of this all-but-forgotten history faded like dust in the wind, leaving the two alicorns in darkness... that slowly brightened a soft radiance as the original wintry setting of Midnight's dimension returned. "So now you know, the secret of this world and every living thing on it," Midnight looked hesitantly at Twilight, whose face read of a pony whose entire world had been turned upside down, her grasp of reality shaken, her doubts in all the knowledge she'd ever learned, now wondering what if it had ever really mattered. Midnight looked up to his tree and willed it to reach down with its branches for him to pluck a bushel of its berries. With but a thought the berries morphed into a bottle of rowanberry wine as a pair of glasses appeared, into which the bottle poured its contents. Taking one for himself, he held the other out to Twilight, "Here, you look like you could use a drink." Twilight ignored it at first, but then absent-mindedly accepted the wine and took a careful sip, "It's... It's nice." "All beverages in my dimension are nice," Midnight shrugged in a 'no big deal' way and took a swig. They sat there in the snow, cold yet warm, as they continued to drink. The glasses never ran out and although the wine worked its tipsy touch on their systems neither became sauced. "So..." Twilight finally spoke, "all the original alicorns except Princess Faust are... no more?" "The Royal Sisters," Midnight responded before letting out another belch and blech-ing the tangy aftertaste. "As far as we know, Celestia and Luna, as I said to you before, are probably the last of their kind. But if any alicorns weren't divided by Princess Faust's spell, they've never revealed themselves. Not to mention it's unlikely any of the original alicorns could still be alive. They could live for a long time, of course, but this all happened thousands of years ago." "Well then..." Twilight was reluctant to ask this but it needed asking, "Why doesn't everypony know about this? The alicorns, the war, the old world and new world, the... alicorns divided into the three pony tribes?" "What good would that do, Twily?" Midnight asked in a blasé tone while peering into his wine glass. "Well, it would clarify history and-and answer so many questions!" Twilight pressed, dropping her wine glass and not noticing it vanish instead of shatter. "So many debates and opinions and theories would be put to rest- This... could change... everything!!" "For the worse," Midnight responded, causing Twilight's moment of exhilaration to shatter. "'For the worse'?!?!" echoed an incredulous Twilight Sparkle. "Midnight Blaze, this isn't just something you cover up and let others fill in the blanks with ideas and theories that are probably entirely wrong! This... This is the true history of our race! Our world!!" "Who would believe it, Twilight?" Midnight asked her, catching off guard by the question. "Who in this world would believe that not only was this planet created by an ancient society of alicorns that no longer exists but that every pony alive descends from the ponies that came to be by the remaining alicorns being divided into the first generation of the three pony tribes? If I didn't know better, I'd call it a crackpot theory concocted by some zealot worshipper." "But- I... Wait, you learned all this from Princess Celestia, right?" Twilight brought up, "So if she herself confirmed it was true-" "That would be a recipe for disaster," Midnight shook his head, starting to get annoyed by how Twilight wasn't seeing the bigger picture. He looked on patiently at Twilight, who was confused by Midnight's words so he knew he had to clarify further. "Twilight, there is still a part of you that clings to the adulation you feel for your mentor, an illusion that she is perfect despite the flaws you've been made aware of as of late. So, if you'd heard this from her directly, you would accept this wild and insane explanation like a foal spoonfed pudding. "There are other ponies like that too, but some less than so. Believe it or not, Twilight, there are ponies among Equestria who are less than impressed by Celestia, or even the other alicorns. Not too long ago, I dealt with this politician in Fillydelphia who showed me admittedly little respect and called my royal status antiquated and obsolete and reminded me that I was still obligated to enforce the laws passed down by democracy. These days, Celestia's rule over Equestria is less than what you might expect it to be, particularly in the larger cities, like Fillydelphia, Manehatten, Baltimare, Vanhoover. "Cities like that in Equestria are democratic and their political leaders are not so beholden to Celestia as ponies from smaller places, like Ponyville, Appleloosa, or even Las Pegasus. The point I'm trying to get at is, some ponies in Equestria would very likely take Celestia's word for it regarding this history and origin I've just shown you, but others wouldn't! Some ponies might even call it a conspiracy by Celestia and the other alicorns as some kind of scheme to enforce their power and dominion over the three pony tribes and even accuse us of trying to excuse our actions and label us tyrants or some kind of bigots. "Then of course there's the ramifications of how this information could have were it learned by other creatures! Griffons, Zebras, Minotaurs! There are some creatures out there who hold ponies in contempt and see ponykind in some shade of bad light. Predatory species who see us as upstart prey who don't know our "proper place in the food chain", less powerful creatures who accuse ponies of taking more than their fair share of land and natural resources. "Believe it or not, Twilight, I had this same discussion with Celestia when she revealed all this to me, and she told me exactly what i'm telling you - Some things are really better left unsaid." Seeing the downcast look on his mare';s face, Midnight went over and wrapped his wing around her withers, "But... if you want to have a clearer understanding, you can always talk with Celestia yourself. She'll always be there to help you, and so will I." Twilight gazed up at her stallion and felt her heart warmed by his gentle smile... and their lips met in a soft and tender kiss. When they parted, she said, "I... don't really know what i'm going to do with all this information, but... I'm glad I have you to help me understand it." "And you always will," Midnight assured her before standing up, "Now, what say we head back?" "WAIT!" Twilight took the study aids she'd gotten from the store Midnight had conjured earlier, making him groan as he realized what she was doing, "I still gotta take notes!" A flash of blue and white light quickly faded and standing back on the field outside Ponyville were a sapphire blue alicorn stallion and his beautiful lavender alicorn mare... next to stack upon stacks of notes. "That... was quite a lesson, Midnight," Twilight gave her stallion a playful smirk before she got starry eyed with anticipation, "and I am looking forward to pouring over these notes! The questions I'll have for Celestia, the knowledge yet to be gained!" "And it's not done yet!" "Whattya mean?" Twilight asked, only for Midnight to point with his forefeather at all the notes she'd taken... and her jaw dropped yet again to see all those beautiful notes of hard and detailed work give off dying sparkles as they faded away?!?! "Wha... I- DUH! WHAT JUST HAPPENED?!?!?!" "Oops! I forgot to mention this," Midnight stifled a shameless chuckle, "Any material object created within an alicorn's pocket dimension cannot exist outside that dimension. Since I created those study aids in my pocket dimension, when you brought them with you here to our native dimension, the different realities clashed and the notes could only react by fading from existence." ... ... ... "You knew that this would happen...." Twilight's voice was eerily calm and yet terrifyingly edged that Midnight felt a chill start from the tip of his tail, run up his spine, all the way up to the point of his horn, and he suddenly feared for his life! Ponyville was enjoying another peaceful day when- "AAAAAAUUUUUUGGGHHHHHH!!!!!" Midnight screamed as he flew for his life, dodging mana zaps aimed at his plot as an utterly incensed Twilight Sparkle pursued him, her face expressing why Tartarus hath no fury like a mare scorned. "Twilight- OW! Calm dow- YIKE! We're making a scene!!" "I can take a lot of things, honey! BUT DESTROYING MY WORK?!?!" Twilight continued to launch more zaps at her stallion's flanks. They didn't do real damage but they stung like the dickens. A couple of ponies watched with amused icecream messy smiles from Sugarcube Corner. "Ah, young love." “Reminds me of when Celestia first found out about this from you and you did the same thing to her,” the other said. “Don't remind me,” the first one said. “She nearly set fire to me.” “We should let them be. Equestria's got something big planned and we're not needed.”