//------------------------------// // Chapter 28 // Story: Twin Twilight Tales // by MagnetBolt //------------------------------// Twilight was the last one to wake up, and by the time she was aware enough to register the voices of the ponies around her, they were already arguing. “We have enough power between us to oppose him without needing the Elements,” Celestia insisted. She sounded caught somewhere between frustration and pleading. “That may be,” Nightmare Moon admitted. It wasn’t growling, not quite, but it still brought to mind angry and possibly rabid animals. “But we will need the Elements to undo the damage he has already done, Celestia.” “What’s going on?” Twilight asked. The world was spinning around her as if she was in some sort of poorly-constructed universe where the planet wasn’t at the center of the cosmos. “We were having a discussion--” Celestia started, before her sister interrupted her. “An argument,” Nightmare Moon corrected. “She’s not a foal.” “We were arguing,” Celestia allowed, with a sigh that indicated she was only admitting they were arguing to forestall an argument about arguing, which was the kind of critical mass of frustration that might lead a pony to go insane and try to kill their sibling. “We were arguing about the Elements of Harmony.” Nightmare Moon narrowed her eyes, clearing her throat and glaring across the room. Twilight was awake enough to appreciate that they were, in fact, in a room now. She looked around at the ancient ruined stone and general decay of the place. It was a total dump. “I agree,” Nightmare Moon said. Twilight realized her internal monologue wasn’t as internal as she’d have liked. “Somepony decided to move into the Canterlot palace instead of actually keeping ours in good condition.” “That has nothing to do with-” Celestia closed her eyes and sighed. “Luna, we can’t use the Elements.” She gestured with one hoof at five stone balls. They didn’t look particularly magical. They just looked dusty. “We’ve used them before,” Nightmare Moon countered. “You even used them all by yourself, as I distinctly recall. I could do the same.” “No, Luna, it’s not that simple.” Celestia sighed. “After I used the Elements on you, I lost my connection to them. For the last thousand years they’ve been inert.” “Inert for you, perhaps.” “For everypony,” Celestia sighed. “Wonderful,” Nightmare Moon spat. “You doomed Equestria even more surely than I ever could have. Where’s your annoying spawn? She can probably come up with something. From what I’ve been able to tell she’s smarter than you.” “Princess Cadance is not my child!” “I wasn’t talking about her, but I can see how you’d be confused with how many ponies here are brighter than the sun.” Celestia’s expression was like somepony sucking on a lemon. “They’re definitely related,” Midnight grumbled, as she trotted into the room. “Here.” She put a glass of water down next to Twilight. “And don’t even start making comparisons. I know you were thinking about some kind of sarcastic comment, because I was, too.” “Have they been arguing this whole time?” Twilight asked. “Mom said when she woke up they were already at it,” Midnight said. “But they were enemies for a thousand years, so this is sort of an improvement I guess.” “Where did Princess Cadance and your mom go?” “They’re in the library. Mom wanted to find everything she could on Discord.” “There’s a library? Why aren’t we in the library?” Twilight stood up on shaking knees, willing to do anything if it meant books. “Fine!” Celestia snapped. “Since I’m so stupid I’ll just shut up and let you take care of things! Go ahead, Luna! Prove me wrong - use the elements! I await your success with bated breath!” “You know, I’m starting to see why they ended up fighting to the death,” Twilight whispered. She was smart enough to want to avoid getting dragged into the argument. “Are you two arguing again?!” Cadance groaned, from the doorway. "All these books in Horse Latin are enough of a headache without screaming..." “Cadance, will you please tell my sister that the Elements can’t be used?” Celestia said, refusing to look at Nightmare Moon. “That’s not strictly true,” Sunset said. She was reading a book as she walked, and had a stack of others at her side. “According to a prophecy, they just need to find new ponies to use them. Sort of a standard chosen-ones type of thing. Clover the Clever said-” “Exactly!” Nightmare Moon declared. “That only proves my point! They were inert while I was gone, and now that I am here to use them, they will reawaken!” Nightmare Moon stalked over to the Elements. “Awaken!” She ordered. They reacted the same way most stone does when ordered, and did nothing. “Come on, you stupid--” Nightmare Moon muttered, growling under her breath and nudged one with a hoof. “I told you, they won’t work for us,” Celestia sighed. “You didn’t let me finish!” Sunset snapped. “Clover the Clever said that six ponies would need to appear, one for each Element! We’ve got six ponies here and--” “You broke them.” Nightmare Moon declared, glaring at her sister and ignoring Sunset. Celestia sighed like steam escaping a kettle. “I didn’t break them!” “Prophesy!” Sunset Shimmer threw the book at the two bickering sisters. Eventually, things settled down, and they were able to talk to each other without the use of shield spells to deflect objects thrown for emphasis. “Discord wasn’t always a danger,” Celestia said. “In fact, he used to be our friend.” Nightmare Moon cleared her throat. “He used to be my friend, at least.” Celestia stopped in front of an old, broken stained-glass window. “There’s a copy of this in Canterlot, but this is the original and, I think, superior.” She cast a spell to repair the cracked glass and wipe away centuries of grime and dirt, revealing the image. An alicorn of light and an alicorn of darkness, circling a distorted figure that could only be Discord. “He was dangerously powerful but relatively harmless for a time,” Nightmare Moon said. “I never trusted him. You must understand that this was not long after Star Swirl vanished. The world wasn’t safe or tame. Celestia was better at making friends than I was.” “And Luna was better at keeping us safe. She was always wiser than I, in some ways.” Nightmare Moon looked pleased at the compliment. “She saw the danger before I did,” Celestia continued. “Discord got bored easily, and as his powers grew he was less able to control exactly what they did.” “It’s his greatest weakness,” Nightmare Moon added. “He has almost unlimited power but at best he can control the intent of his magic, and not the exact result. It does tend towards ironic ends, but his inability to dictate details is the reason all of us escaped.” “That inability to control himself is why ponies feared him, even when he was trying to help,” Celestia said. “Replacing a ruined field of grain with trees that grow filled jam jars might be unexpected and technically edible, but there are very few ponies that want to eat bowls of jam for months on end just to survive the winter.” “Or when he turned grass into sugar floss because he thought plain grass was dull. It all washed away in the rain, then the barren hillside had no roots holding it together and turned into a mudslide…” Nightmare Moon shook her head. “One bad decision led to compounding problems. He was never satisfied to leave things as they were.” “There were some good things he did,” Celestia hastily put in. “He never intentionally hurt a pony, and healed the ones that did get hurt, even when it wasn’t his fault.” “We tried to convince him to stop.” “He did stop,” Celestia reminded Nightmare Moon. “For a little while.” “What made him snap?” Sunset asked. “Did somepony die? An argument between sisters maybe?” “It’s never just one thing,” Celestia said. “It takes time. His resentment built up, and I failed him as a friend by not seeing it happen.” “He decided the world would be better if he was in charge,” Nightmare Moon said. “And that was that. We tried stopping him, failed, and he let us go. We spent decades trying to find a way to save Equestria.” “We think it was decades, at least. It wasn’t just the sun and moon - time itself became unstuck. In some places, Discord had only taken over hours ago. In others, it had been generations. It’s one reason there are no real history books of the Discordant Era: there is no single narrative.” “Eventually we found the Elements of Harmony,” Nightmare Moon said. “And with them we were able to seal Discord in stone - which is what we need to do again.” “Where did you find them?” Cadance asked. “Under this very castle,” Nightmare Moon said. “It’s the reason we had it built in the first place.” “Well, maybe we should check there? There could be something we need to make them work again.” Cadance suggested. “A tree?” Sunset asked, looking up at the huge crystal structure. “It used to be smaller,” Celestia said. "Sort of a shrubbery." “Look,” Twilight said, pushing sand aside. “The roots go down into the rock. It looks like a crystal, but it’s growing like a living thing instead of a mineral.” “I wonder how deep it goes,” Midnight looked down into the crack. “Is it a plant? Are there more like it?” “It’s definitely a magical structure,” Twilight said. “We aren’t sure where it came from,” Nightmare Moon said, keeping her distance. She was wary of it, after her time on the moon. “Celestia and I found it when we were sheltering from a storm that was raining cats and dogs. And no, that is not a metaphor.” “The Elements looked more like gems in the window art,” Sunset muttered, rapping her hoof against one of the stone balls. “What’s the plan, rub these against the tree and hope they recharge or something?” “They’re…” Nightmare Moon grimaced. “Temperamental.” “That’s putting it lightly,” Celestia mused. “After we fought, they refused to activate again for me, and Magic disappeared entirely.” “Magic?” Twilight asked, looking up. “Magic, Honesty, Loyalty, Laughter, Generosity, and Kindness,” Celestia explained. “The six Elements of Harmony.” “You mean Sorcery, Strength, Bravery, Hope, Beauty, and Healing,” Nightmare Moon corrected. “They’re the Elements of Harmony, not Elements of bad translation from Horse Latin.” “We’ve argued about this before, Luna. Neither of us could read Star Swirl’s hoofwriting well enough to tell!” “Bah!” Nightmare Moon turned away. “If they were the Elements of Bickering we’d have them working by now.” “What does Star Swirl have to do with it?” Sunset asked, turning away from a floating tracery of the magic floating off of the tree. “That’s an excellent question,” Celestia said, with a sigh. “Sunset, you know how I have spent years trying to appear as an all-knowing, wise immortal mentor?” “Yeah?” “You know how sometimes I give you cryptic answers to questions and make you learn by finding things out for yourself?” “Yeah…?” “That’s because sometimes I’m faking it and I have no idea what to say,” Celestia said. “And I’m trying not to panic and I want to sound like I’m an authority because I spent a thousand years with no one to help me or confide in and I couldn’t ever say ‘I don’t know’ because then ponies start to panic and it causes the Recession of 439!” “That was when the Neighponese tea trade collapsed,” Midnight helpfully chimed in. “It happened because I forgot which fork was for the salad course!” “Is that what all those nightmares were about?” Nightmare Moon asked, amused. “You saw those?!” “I could still see dreams from the Moon, sister, just as we were able to share a dream when you were trapped in the Sun.” “You shared a dream?” Twilight asked. “Yes, it was a twisted version of our own past,” Nightmare Moon replied. She pawed at the ground for the moment, thoughtful. “I’m not sure if he expected it to drive us apart or merely drive Celestia insane.” “I had to suffer the same isolation and mistrust Luna did,” Celestia said. “It was educational.” “Indeed,” Nightmare Moon nodded. “I think it backfired, though. It was rather pleasant for me.” “You were lucky,” Cadance sighed. “Sunset and I were stuck in some strange world.” “It was the Power Ponies,” Sunset specified. “You got to meet the Power Ponies?!” Midnight gasped. “Yeah,” Sunset grinned. “Turns out I’m stronger than all of them put together, though.” “Well we got sent to bucking Tartarus,” Twilight said, flatly. “You all got to play around and he sent us to Pony Hell.” “That’s because he knows you two are the most dangerous,” Sunset said, turning back to her analysis spell. “You’ve almost blown up Equestria in your spare time. He’s probably worried about what you’d do if you really put your minds to it.” “Like that plan to blow up the moon,” Midnight agreed. “The what to WHAT?!” Nightmare Moon sputtered. “Any ideas?” Cadance asked. She sat down next to Sunset, trying to decipher the images flashing in front of the unicorn. “We could cut it down to count the rings,” Sunset sighed. “Aside from that, I’ve got nothing. The Elements are totally inert to all scanning spells I’ve thrown at them, but I’m not sure what to make of that.” “Pretend I went to Canterlot High and not the School for Gifted unicorns.” “Cadance, I tutored you. I know you’re not an idiot.” “I know, and I like it when you explain things to me.” She shifted closer to Sunset and wrapped a wing around her shoulders. “Brains are sexy.” Sunset gave her a look. “Okay fine, brains are gross wrinkly grey things, but you’re smart and I feel better when you tell me what’s going on,” Cadance sighed. “I’ll believe that one,” Sunset said. “Okay, so, the Elements are these stone balls. And both Nightmare Moon and Celestia agree that they’re the real thing. The problem is, I can’t detect any magic, which means one of two things.” “I suppose the first choice is that these are just rocks?” Cadance guessed. “Yep. Or option two, they’re really powerful.” Cadance tilted her head like a confused cat. Or pony, in this case. “Extremely powerful artifacts, especially ancient ones, often lack any kind of detectable magical aura,” Sunset explained. “It’s like, um…” She tried to think of the kind of easily-explained and almost entirely incorrect metaphor that teachers always used to explain difficult concepts to their students to get them to stop asking difficult questions. “Think of an enchanted item as being like a balloon. It’s filled with magic and flaws in the enchantment allow it to slowly leak out, in the same way a balloon slowly deflates. The more magic it holds, the more pressure the balloon is holding back. With me so far?” Cadance nodded slowly “Beyond a certain point, the pressure is too much to handle for normal methods - like a rubber balloon popping from being overinflated. Powerful enchanted objects tend not to leak magic because if they had the same types of flaws, all the magic would explode out of them right away. In our metaphor, they’re more like steel oxygen tanks. There’s no detectable leakage, and any flaw becomes catastrophic. If an artifact is ancient, it’s lasted a long time without suffering that kind of catastrophic failure and so it has to be almost perfect.” “That makes sense,” Cadance agreed. “So if they’re really powerful artifacts more than a thousand years old, it’d be silly to expect to sense magic,” Sunset shrugged. “Unfortunately the same could be said about rocks.” Twilight and Midnight sat with a stone sphere between them. “Which one is this?” Midnight asked. “Nightmare Moon said it was Strength,” Twilight muttered. “Then Celestia told her it was Honesty. Then they got into an argument about the translation again and Nightmare Moon said, and I’m paraphrasing, ‘if it’s Honesty it’s a wonder any of the feathering things ever worked for you’.” “I’m starting to like Celestia’s plan of trying to overpower Discord,” Midnight admitted. “I’m sure Nightmare Moon is right that these are a more elegant solution but we can’t spend the next thousand years trying to figure out how to make them work.” “It’s worth trying, though,” Twilight countered. “Nightmare Moon did say this cavern should be totally safe from Discord, so we’re not really in any danger as long as we stay here. We’ve got some time to work on the problem before we give up and brute force the answer.” “So what do you think, drained of energy, or locked?” Midnight asked, changing the subject and nudging the ball with her hoof. “Let’s assumed locked,” Twilight said. “If they’re drained of energy they’re useless. You know how hard it is to recharge a drained enchantment.” “What is it, a theoretical maximum of 20% efficiency in transferring power into a drained item to recharge it?” Midnight asked. “And that’s if the item was designed to even be recharged in the first place.” “We could hack something together, but anything strong enough to stop Discord would drain all of us, and there are six of them. So like I said, if they’re drained, we might as well go with plan F.” Midnight mentally counted off plans until she got to F. “Throw rocks at him?” “At least the Elements would still be good for that.” “Before we use them as ammunition, let’s try unlocking them. You grabbed the book Sunset threw at the Princesses?” “Sure,” Twilight pulled it out of her saddlebags. She flipped it open. “It’s prophesy, though, and you know what that’s like.” “Light on specifics and useful information?” Midnight guessed. “I’ve been thinking about it, though,” Twilight said. She started pacing while Midnight flipped through the painted and hoof-lettered pages, the book predating the advent of the printing press and, unfortunately, modern standards of spelling and grammar. “Discord went out of his way to separate us. He could have thrown all of us into Tartarus, or the moon, or turned us into stone.” “Celestia said he wasn’t good with details.” “This is more than just details. Think about it. Princess Celestia and Nightmare Moon had to relive the worst time in their lives. Your mom was forced to be a bad guy. Princess Cadance was a victim. We got stuck in Tartarus and in the end he tried to play us against each other. He was trying to drive us apart.” “Oh feathers, I hope we don’t have to kiss or something to make these work.” Twilight stumbled and gagged at that idea. “Luna,” Celestia said, patiently. Nightmare Moon waved a wing at her, dismissively, as she carefully rubbed one of the inert Elements against the Tree of Harmony. “Luna,” Celestia sighed. “I am busy,” Nightmare Moon muttered. “You are not busy. You are trying everything that comes to mind no matter how unlikely it is to work.” She didn’t say stupid. She thought it, very hard, but she didn’t say it. Nightmare Moon put the Element down and took a deep breath. She didn’t say it either, but she knew it was stupid. “The first time all we did was grab them and it just… worked,” Nightmare Moon said. “We didn’t have to sit in front of the tree trying to figure it out while Equestria burned.” Celestia sat down next to her. She considered trying to hug Luna with the same calculations one might make in evaluating how to console a depressed tiger. “Don’t tell them this, but I had hoped this would be as easy as the first time.” “Luna, the first time we fought him, you almost drowned in a lake of caramel sauce, and I spent a week as a potted plant.” “Going by that metric, we’re ahead of the game,” Nightmare Moon snorted. "I'm just worried. You know that dream I had--" "It was a dream within a dream. It's possible it won't come true. Focus on victory." Celestia swallowed, wishing she’d been able to get a few stiff drinks to brace herself. “After it’s over, and we’ve won, what will you do?” “At this point I think planning anything is useless,” Nightmare Moon said. She nodded towards Twilight and Midnight. “Those two freed me years before I expected, and then instead of glorious revenge, I’m immediately required to save Equestria. And they haven’t said anything, but I suspect they’re not entirely blameless for Discord’s escape.” “It wouldn’t shock me,” Celestia admitted, quietly. She didn’t want to embarrass her students in the middle of a world-ending crisis. “I took them on as my students partly to keep a close eye on them. Even so, they cause disasters on a nearly annual basis.” “Ah, so you’re teaching them for the same reason Star Swirl taught us.” “Exactly.” Nightmare Moon chuckled, just a little. “I missed this.” Celestia said. “I spent a thousand years hating myself and worrying. I missed just being able to spend time with my sister.” “It would be better if the world wasn’t in peril.” “But if it wasn’t, we’d be at each other’s throats,” Celestia said. Her expression fell and her shoulders slumped. “Maybe that’s why the Elements aren’t working.” “Because we’re enemies?” Nightmare Moon mused. “If that was the case, all we would have to do is stop being enemies. Wonderful.” “No matter what happens, Luna, I won’t fight you again,” Celestia said. “I made the wrong choice last time. I neglected you because I thought I was doing what was needed for Equestria. If I’d been smarter and sided with you instead of ignoring your concerns, I could have kept you from being traumatized, we wouldn’t be having this problem now, and I’d be able to sleep more than a few hours at a time.” Nightmare Moon raised an eyebrow. “It’s true! Between hunting monsters and having to keep the sun and moon in order, court and paperwork all day…” Celestia huffed. “If it wasn’t for Sunset and Cadance taking up a few of my duties I’d be so sleep deprived I’d fall asleep halfway through fighting Discord.” That got a more genuine laugh out of Nightmare Moon. “And worse, with you gone I haven’t been able to get a real night’s rest. It’s just been constant, well…” “Nightmares?” “Nightmares about Nightmares, among other things. You used to keep everypony safe from things like that.” “You know I wanted to keep everypony happy and safe,” Nightmare Moon said. “And they rejected me.” “I saw it from the front row seats in that dream.” “When I came back, the first thing I saw were ponies excited for my return. They knew who I was and they went out of their way to bring me back. They didn’t pity me or hate me, they were excited and wanted me to save them.” Nightmare Moon sighed. “I enjoyed it. That’s why I can’t let them down.” “Even if it means putting aside your grudge with me?” “Keep asking and I may change my mind.” “What was that?” Sunset leaned in closer, the illusory display moving with her. She grunted in annoyance and recast the spell, fixing it in place and focusing it in a new spot. “What was what?” Cadance asked. “There was some kind of burst in the magical flow from the Tree,” Sunset said. “I’m not sure what caused it…” She looked around the room. “Hey, whatever you were doing a minute ago, do it again!” Celestia looked at Nightmare Moon. Nightmare Moon glanced at the magic circle Twilight had started drawing and which looked worryingly like an implosion lens. Midnight did her best to look casual. “Which one of us?” Celestia asked, after the moment of confusion passed. “I don’t know! But the Tree started moving a lot of magic-” “To where, exactly?” Nightmare Moon asked, cutting her off. Sunset pointed. “That was…” Nightmare Moon narrowed her eyes in concentration. “Hope? I think?” “I believe you’re right,” Celestia said. “But…” She stood and turned. “The actual Element is over on the other side of the room. None of us did anything to it.” “How can you even tell which is which?” Twilight asked. Celestia stepped closer and ‘accidentally’ smudged part of the magical array, disarming it. “There’s a feeling to them. You never forget it. It’s like… an old friend. You can spend years and years apart, then you see them again and it all comes back.” “Hope was one of mine,” Nightmare Moon said. She grunted as she stood up. “Blasted Equuis gravity…” “Is gravity different on the moon?” Twilight asked. “We’ll discuss it later,” Nightmare Moon said. “For now we must deal with matters of greater gravitas than gravity.” “Oh my stars, Luna,” Celestia groaned. “It was a good pun.” “It was terrible.” “That is exactly why it is a good pun,” Nightmare Moon countered. She leaned down to look closely at Hope. “Now, if the Tree is feeding energy to this, then perhaps bringing them here was all we needed to do. It would not surprise me if--” Her hoof contacted the surface of the stone sphere, and it shattered. Nightmare Moon looked down at the shards. The swear she used cannot be repeated in polite company. “Wow, the readings just skyrocketed! Do that again!” Sunset said. She was watching her displays instead of the room and ignoring the way Cadance was urgently trying to get her attention. “That might be difficult,” Nightmare Moon said. “I-- Hm.” She paused, then cast a spell that instantly swapped her with Celestia in a flash of teleportation. “Celestia broke it!” “Luna! That hasn’t worked since we were foals!” “It worked on Star Swirl and he is-” (or was, the historical record is shockingly unclear on this point) “-one of the most brilliant minds in Equestria.” “Whatever, whatever,” Sunset said, still not listening. “I think something’s about to-” There was a flash of silver light like someone had turned moonlight into a blinding strobe. Reactions from the ponies were varied. Sunset had thrown herself on top of Cadance to protect her from what had looked like an uncontrolled magical surge. Cadance had frozen like a terrified statue. Twilight and Midnight had both tried to cast the same shield spell at the same time while in close proximity and ended up sending each other bouncing across the room like rubber balls. Celestia, like always, maintained her poise and grace and definitely hadn’t made a strangled sound like a surprised duck. Nightmare Moon’s reaction was to grab at her peytral. “What happened?!” She tugged at the metal, trying to get away from it. The sensation had been somewhere between a warm hug and elastic snapping back into place. She had a sudden image of her armor having flash-heated to molten ruin, and the panic didn’t abate until she’d gotten it off of her neck and gotten a look at it. The blue-black metal had been warped to allow a large gem to sit comfortably in the center, a pale blue crescent moon radiating magic, light glinting off of it in rainbows like it had passed through a prism. “It just seems odd that Laughter would awaken for Luna, is all,” Celestia said. “Mmhmm,” Sunset said, distracted. “I’m not saying she’s unworthy. Obviously she’s worthy. I’m just--” Celestia leaned closer to whisper into Sunset’s ear. “She was going to plunge the world into eternal night and I’m not entirely clear on how that fits in with Laughter! Or Hope, for that matter, if we go with her translation.” Nightmare Moon’s cackle echoed through the cavern. Sunset looked up at Celestia and shrugged. “Maybe that counts?” “This is great!” Twilight pranced around Nightmare Moon. “That means we can save Equestria!” “It’s definitely progress,” Midnight agreed. Nightmare settled down on the stone so she didn’t have to look quite so far down at the fillies. She adjusted the peytral, though in truth it was already perfectly seated. It was somewhere between a nervous tic and the vain preening of a peacock. “Let’s save the excitement for after we get the others, hm?” Nightmare Moon suggested. “Right,” Midnight said. She grabbed one of the orbs. “All we have to do is smash them!” “Eeeh!” Celestia’s golden aura surrounded it just before the filly could try cracking it like a nut. “What have I told you, girls, repeatedly?” “Don’t attempt to teleport into solid objects,” Twilight said. “What have I told you girls that is relevant to this situation?” Celestia corrected. “Don’t attempt destructive experimentation on anything you can’t replace,” Midnight sighed. Celestia cleared her throat. “Especially not on ponies, small animals, and irreplaceable magical artifacts,” Twilight mumbled. “There you go,” Celestia said, sitting next to her sister. “I think I understand what happened,” Cadance said. “Please, do explain,” Celestia motioned for her to go on. “I think the Elements awaken in reaction to a need, not a desire, and they can only be used by ponies they choose,” Cadance continued. “Hope woke up, because Nightmare Moon was brought here by the wishes of two fillies that thought she could save Equestria, and she took up that role and set her own grudge aside.” “There are simply bigger fish to fry, to use a Griffonian phrase,” Nightmare Moon said, with a mild shrug. “A common foe like Discord cannot be ignored.” "Now we just need to awaken Celestia's connection," Sunset said. “I can’t use them anymore,” Celestia said. She looked down at her hooves, unable to meet Sunset’s gaze. “They're a symbol of harmony and unity. I lost my connection because I abused their power. I thought I was doing the right thing by doing what duty demanded. I was wrong.” “And you learned that sometimes loyalty to your friends and your family is more important than duty,” Sunset said. She swallowed, looking away and taking a few moments to gather her words. “That’s why you kept giving me chances, even though I wasn’t a very good student.” “You were an excellent student,” Celestia countered. “Just troubled.” “I was cruel to the ponies around me. I didn’t respect anypony. I didn’t listen to you when you were trying to help. If you’d given up on me when everypony else told you to, I don’t know where I’d be today.” “I’d never give up on you, Sunset.” Celestia whispered. “You’re like a daughter to me.” “That’s what it means to be loyal. It means sticking by other ponies even when they might be a lost cause, or trusting them even when you’ve wronged each other.” One of the orbs cracked on its own. A lance of ruby light struck Celestia’s chest, and a red sun took the place of the amethyst that had occupied her peytral, the gem gleaming like it was sitting under the summer sky. “Well,” Celestia said. “As long as we’re going around, Princess Cadance--” “Kindness,” Twilight said. “Yep, Kindness,” Midnight agreed. “Kindness. Definitely.” Sunset nodded. “I still think Healing is a better translation,” Nightmare Moon grumbled. Cadance didn’t get to say anything before the Element broke open like an egg and a pink heart was hammered into place on her jewelry. “Really? Just like that?” Cadance asked. “I don’t know what to say,” Sunset shrugged. “Nopony else in the world would put up with me. I think the Royal Guard owe you a couple medals for service to the Crown.” “I am 'the Crown.'” “They’ll make an exception for you,” Sunset retorted, pecking her on the cheek. “Perhaps there is something to your prophecy theory,” Nightmare Moon admitted. “Six ponies here, at a time of need. Of course, it’s obvious what you would represent.” “Magic?” Midnight guessed. “No,” Nightmare Moon said. “Well, perhaps. But there’s something that fits even better.” “Well it can’t be Honesty,” Sunset said. “I’m not a huge liar, but Celestia still doesn’t know how many nights I spent in the Black Archives.” “When were you in the--” Celestia started, before her sister cut her off. “That’s because as I keep saying, Honesty is a bad translation. It should more properly be called Strength, or perhaps Conviction.” Nightmare Moon raised her chin. “You have more power than any unicorn I’ve ever known, and more than that, you have the drive and will to see your will done in the world.” “It’s why I trusted you to find a way to stop Discord,” Celestia added. “I knew that you wouldn’t give up. When you set your mind to something, you don’t quit. Like when you decided you were going to find the truth about a certain mirror.” A fourth Element opened, and energy crackled through the air towards Sunset. “Wait, I’m not wearing any jewelry!” She didn’t have time to dodge and had a sudden image of herself with a gemstone embedded in her skin like some kind of inadvisable, magical body modification. Instead, when the light faded, an amber sun hung around her neck on a lacework of gold wire. “That is Strength,” Nightmare Moon said, approval in her voice. “That is power. Not just steel, but the hoof that wields it.” Twilight and Midnight both looked at the last orb, the one they’d been experimenting with. “So then this one is either Beauty or Sorcery,” Twilight said. “Well if it’s Beauty, you can have it,” Midnight said. “You’re not too bad looking.” “I’d feel flattered if we weren’t identical.” Twilight giggled. “But even with Sorcery, we both share our magic.” “Sister did say she misplaced Magic,” Nightmare Moon said. “Five orbs, but there are six elements. Do you have any idea where it might have gotten to?” “Magic was always the most reclariant,” Celestia said. She stood and walked over to the two fillies. “It was a focus, like the general of an army. And just like a general, it was nothing without the rest to back it up.” Sunset shrugged. “Nightmare Moon is wrong about the translation on that one, though. It’s definitely Generosity. And the reason there’s only one there is because for the last seven years these two have been learning about how to share your magic.” “You can’t be serious,” Twilight deadpanned. “I’m very serious.” “You’re saying we’re stuck like this--” Midnight started. “--because of some prophecy--” Twilight continued. “--which we don’t even get a say in--” “--and it’s all just a lesson about sharing?!” They finished at the same time. The sphere split cleanly in half before the inner edges burst into light, the stone melting and flying up around them like sparks from a bonfire. When the swirling lights cleared, Twilight and Midnight wore identical necklaces. Nearly identical. They had a pattern of gold and silver filigree, a gem in the center shaped like their cutie marks, but the gold and silver were reversed for each of them, and the gem… “What color is that?” Twilight asked, trying to see her own Element. “It kind of shifts depending on how you hold it, like a butterfly wing or a soap bubble,” Midnight said, tilting her head. "Weird," Twilight said, poking the gem. “Sort of indigo and violet,” Midnight agreed. She tilted her necklace and watched the color shift in the light. At the same time, Twilight’s Element changed the other way, like they were connected. Twilight was smart enough to realize that was almost certainly the exact case. They probably were connected. “That’s very interesting,” Celestia said, craning her neck to look closely. “I can’t tell which is which.” “This isn’t how the elements were, a thousand years ago,” Nightmare Moon said. “But that may work to our advantage.” “I agree,” Celestia nodded. “Discord’s greatest strength was his unpredictability. It makes his magic almost impossible to counter, and planning against him is often foolhardy. But if we can surprise him like this…” “It’s going to work,” Sunset said, confidently.