Suddenly I’m not me anymore. I’m above myself, high above, and drifting upward. I can see the Queen’s back, the vertebrae in her spine just visibly pressing out of her skin, myself sprawled below her.
A light above me, brighter than anything I’ve ever seen. Champagne silver like polished zirconium, so bright I should be blind but it doesn’t hurt.
I’m traveling to it, faster and faster, there’s no frame of reference but the momentum building in me, I feel like a bullet or a photon myself, faster and faster and faster.
I reach the other side. There’s a being here; I feel a presence. Like an old friend I never knew I had, a sibling I forgot I grew up with. And I am filled with love. Peace and joy steep inside me, love soaks down to every fiber of me. I’m giddy with it, filled with energy and pure unending love and acceptance.
My life unfolds out from me in one; everything at once and all of it comprehensible. I feel my tongue scalding on the first cup of coffee I ever tasted, though the pain is not upsetting; I feel the magic bursting wings from my back as Celestia transforms me into an alicorn, hear the girls talking to me as I see you for the first time, smell the smoke and dust as Golden Oaks explodes, see the moon crawling into the sky the night after Luna’s return, feel the quill in my magic as I write you a letter, feel my legs move as I sleepwalk and my heart race when you find me.
I feel no judgment for any of it, not for the times I was bad or the times I was good. It’s all drenched in love, everything is. I am loved despite all of the mistakes I’ve made and all of the time I’ve wasted.
I am without a body anymore, but it takes me a minute to realize it. I am still myself, but I am more pure. Cleaner, stronger, like I’ve been diluted all my life in Equestria and this has distilled me back into my true form. The light stretches out into infinity, I feel it’s boundlessness and I am at once a part of it. I am limitless into the light and the being.
Hello Twilight.
The greeting comes not as words but as pure thoughts. Voiceless intent. It feels more real than anything I’ve ever felt before, it feels like I’ve finally woken up. It comes out of me, Yes.
You are a good pony. I know you have many questions.
Yes, yes I do, I want to know everything about everything. And I want to know how I’m supposed to know what to do. When I leave I’m going to be afraid again. How do I know what I should do, who I should be? How to be the ambassador, the leader of friendship?
I will tell you that your life is important. You are here in Equestria to learn, Twilight. To learn about love and friendship. Love, in all it’s forms, is what matters in life. You are here to help one another, to love one another. Remember to love. You are gifted with free will, and you must choose what to do with it. So long as you choose to love, you will flourish.
I will come back here, won’t I?
Yes.
I love you.
I love you as well. I know you want to stay. You have yet to love your fullest, Twilight. You have yet to lead who you need to. It is not your time, though it is very good to see you.
...God?
You may call me that.
Thank you.
You are very welcome, Twilight Sparkle.
Things start to fade. I can feel myself picking up speed again, the momentum pooling backwards as if I’m falling, leaving the love and the peace and slipping back into the dreamyness of regular reality.
I can see again. I’m in the marble plane. The Queen takes her hoof off of me, and my heart stings as it beats.
“It might hurt a bit. Do you feel better?”
I smile. I feel like smiling. I want to dance and yell and laugh and explode with joy.
“You look better.”
“Yes.” I stand up, tingling all over.
She presses one hoof onto my withers. “Remember what I told you.”
“I will.”
“I have full faith in you. You will be a great pony. Use your new powers wisely.”
“Powers?”
“It’s all inside you already. It will come naturally.”
“Okay. I trust you.” Confidence and determination swell in my chest, despite myself.I want to do this. I want to make her proud, and I want to run back to you to tell you all about it.
“Are you ready to go back?”
“Yes.”
“Welcome to alicornhood, Princess Twilight Sparkle.”
“Thank you, Queen—wait what’s your name?”
“Globin. Goodbye.”
She pushes down hard and I smash through the floor. I freefall through the marble, burning needles pierce through the skin along my mane and tail, some lump of energy spikes through my brain and my horn, everything stretches and burns inside—
My lungs decompress suddenly and I’m flailing through the air.
I splash into the river, and surface with my mouth full of water and my eyes burning.
“Twilight!” you and all the girls call. I swim to you, and dimly notice it feels like my legs are longer than usual. But I can’t focus on anything but your face, your beautiful concerned face.
I grin ear to ear, unable and unwilling to contain it as I slip trying to run the last distance to you, and tackle everyone I can reach into a hug. This place is so strange and otherworldfully wonderful now. I focus myself on you, your joyous, beautiful face, and pull you into my forelegs through everyone else. I feel like I can see your soul in your deep, brilliantly blue eyes, like I’m asking permission to join you in there. Or you with me, but it doesn’t matter because we’ll be together. And I can feel you lean forward, then hesitate, but I’m already pressing my lips against yours. I hear everyone gasp and giggle in surprise, as we kiss and you pull your forelegs around my neck. I know it’s not good, it’s my first kiss and I don’t know what I’m doing at all, but I can tell that you do. And damn you feel good, and oh my Celestia I’ve never tasted somepony’s lips before it’s so weird and new and amazing.
We part after a moment, and I’m still thinking about you, about all of you as a zebra, when I feel magic involuntarily stir inside me. The words of the spell ring from a language I don’t speak, the focus and mental parameters I need to cast it come from nowhere and are similar only to the spells I used once to raise the sun and moon. It comes from nowhere and everywhere at once; like it was carved onto my bones and wound inside my flesh.
Halos light over your head. I can see them even through your face, which is simultaneously unobstructed by them. An impulse flashes to me and I can almost read them. The strips and crashes of color, the spinning and the points where some bands sever themselves for a gap of air, it’s all you, your personality, represented in twenty different glittering ways. It must be the rest of my power.
Pinkie slams into us, I catch a glimpse of the rings burning fuchsia over her before the sudden motion breaks my spell. She pours her happy out in wild squeals, “AaaaaAH, you’re dating! I’m going to throw you a dating party—NO a double date with Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash! And Twilight, you’re so tall now! And--”
“Darling, your mane!”
I crane my chin around to see what I can of my mane, then flip my tail around and look at it too. It’s become flowing and ethereal, just like the royal sisters’ manes. It’s deep purple with streaks of violet and hot pink that melt into a band of sunrise orange running through the wine-dark like dusk peering through clouds. A coppery sheen streaks over it all and catches the light from the lanterns. I’m sitting on a piece of evening sky.
I look back up and laugh. The spell is still inside me. I’ll have to investigate it later. “We should move back to Zecora’s hut, where it’s safer.”
“Do you feel better?” Applejack asks. She’s such a sweetheart. I pull her over and squeeze her tight.
“I do. I’ll talk about it while we walk. Zecora,” I turn back to your grinning face and ask you, “Is it okay if I do something?”
Intrigued and completely on board, you say, “Yes of course, what is it you beautiful horse?”
I maneuver around you, trembling on my legs that are at least two hooves longer than they used to be, then slide my head under your rump, stepping forward and pushing up so you fall down on my back. “I want to carry you home.”
You hug me tight, and with you kindling such a warmth in my chest, we all start forward. I don’t need it, but I cast light from my horn like Rarity and Starlight are doing. Fluttershy, on my left, asks, “So what happened? Do you feel okay? You’re crying!”
“I feel at peace. I feel so, so happy!” Now that she mentions it, I notice the warmth streaking wetly down my cheeks. I let it flow. Even with you on my back I’ve never felt so light as I do right now. So free and open. “I think, after becoming an alicorn and a princess, I just wasn’t sure of my new role and my new body. I didn’t feel at home in it anymore, or in my place in the world. Suddenly, it wasn’t me, Twilight, a magic dork, it was me Twilight and a pegasus and alicorn magic and an earthpony all wrapped up to be a princess. I guess it took a long time for me to realize it. But now, well, I feel better. I feel whole. And I still don’t feel like a princess, but I know it’s doable now. I can do this now.”
You squeeze me again, and smush your muzzle against the side of my head to whisper, “I’m so glad you found what you were looking for.”
I flicker my head back at you as best as I can, “It’s thanks to you. We have a lot to talk about.”
You focus your energy on hugging me and snuggling my long neck while we walk. Things look different now that I’m taller. But they feel real again, even with the unusual angle everything is at now. “I found my purpose,” I say to the girls. “I’m going to manage relations between Equestria and all the other nations that we’ve started to befriend. I don’t know exactly how to do it, I have a lot of reading to do now, but I’m going to do it. I’m going to bring friendship to everyone I can.”
“Wow Twilight,” Spike says, running alongside me. “Are you going to do it with the dragons too?”
“Of course! And I would love your help with that, Spike.”
“But what happened in there?” Starlight asks. She’s close to my side suddenly, and looks more terrified than the rest.
“I met the Queen. And she euthanized the old me so I could grow.”
“What?!” Most of them yell. I feel you tense up over my back, but I just laugh again. Everything is gloriously okay now. Even thinking about the halo spell in the back of my mind, my head is clear at last. And these tears are so refreshing.
I describe what happened to me, how the Queen inhabits a world above ours, how she sent me on for just a few moments, how she’s taking care of us right now. Rarity nearly faints when I tell her she was completely bald.
We hit the sparse clearing around your hut, and I sit down to let you climb off. I want to keep you on my back, to let you just hug on me all day, but it’s not exactly practical right now. You kiss me on my ear and wipe some of the water off my face before you walk past to open the door and let us in.
Inside, you pull out more cushions and put a large kettle on for tea. Then you sit next to me, and bring your flank up to mine. It fills my whole leg with warmth; tingles up the base of my spine and throws me into another giggle fit.
We talk more. Starlight slowly grows less anxious as you grow more anxious. After a half hour explaining everything and answering questions, I turn to you. You lift your head up to look me in the eyes. That beautiful face fills my vision and I can feel your breath on my nose.
“Zecora, would you like to say something as well?”
You bite your lip. Then turn back to the rest of the group. I pull my wing out and put it over your back. You speak, “There is something I would like to say, to everypony here today. I have for all this time, spoken only in rhyme...”
You tell your whole story, everything you told me. They can feel how nervous you are; that something big is coming.
And then you dwindle down to your last lines, “And that is why I think it’s time that I stop speaking in ...verse. I hope you all will understand.”
“Aw shucks, sugarcube, you don’t have to rhyme when you talk for us to like you!” Applejack beams at you. “I think your voice sounds right pretty in normal speak anyway.”
“Yeah, Zecora,” Fluttershy says, “You don’t have to rhyme if you don’t want to.”
“Eeeeeeeeee!” Pinkie jumps up and tackles you out of my wing. “I love it! We have another party to throw!” From under her crushing hug, you look up at me.
And grin as the tears roll down from both of us.