//------------------------------//
// 5. The Pegasus Race 
// Story: An Early Reunion 
// by RainbowDoubleDash 
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Once, when she was a little filly who still believed herself to be a simple earth pony adopted into a family of earth pony vitners, a carnival had come to Celestia’s home town, Città delle Colline Rotolanti (the townsponies normally simply shortened its name to "Rotolanti"). This had been a major event, as travelling shows rarely made their way to Rotolanti– it was not something to be missed, not even in the midst of harvest season.

Celestia – then Cadenza – had been impressed by the acrobats, astounded by the jugglers, amused by the clowns. The memory that stood out most in her mind, however, were the trio of pegasi fliers claiming to be the fastest and bravest fliers in all of Cavallia. The trio had indeed lived up to that name, performing magnificent tricks and acts of derring-do in the air, dodging lightning bolts of their own creation and racing each other and any challengers across the sky. One had even claimed that he was capable of doing the legendary Sonic Rainboom, though he had not demonstrated such talent at the carnival, and Celestia had personally always suspected that he had been lying to make himself look good. Really, he had not needed to – even without performing such a stunt, he had been an amazing flier that had left Celestia in awe.

It was a similar feeling of awe that now enveloped Celestia as she chased after Luna, who, on seeing her finally recovering from her shock and giving chase, had dived down low, hovering a few feet above the tiled rooftops of Canterlot’s four-and-five story tenements, watching Celestia approach carefully, the same wry grin on her features.

Celestia wasn’t much surprised when, just as she closed in on Luna, the blue alicorn once more beat her wings, taking to the sky easily. Celestia had to flare her wings wide to slow her motion, beating against her own inertia and alighting atop a chimney, before kicking off and taking to the sky once more after Luna. The Princess rolled to avoid Celestia’s charge, letting gravity take over as she fell to the streets of Canterlot, smirking the whole time with her back to the ground. 

Celestia stopped her ascent and dove after her, easily exceeding the mere pull of gravity and closing within just a few feet of Luna before the Princess put her wings to work once more, pushing away and forwards, her downward motion stopped with minimal effort as her wings caught air currents and buoyed her away from the ground, but only just. Her silver-shod right front hoof dangled lower than the rest, striking the moonlit, cobblestone streets of Canterlot as she moved through them and sending up sparks as metal scraped stone. At this time of night, with only the moon and the stars to provide illumination, there were precious few ponies on the streets, but there was enough that after a few moments, Luna sent herself skywards again, out of their way and towards a bank of clouds gathering over Canterlot.

Celestia, once more, was not nearly so fast at changing directions. She was nevertheless swiftly after the lunar princess as she spun in the night air, Luna’s direction changing from vertical to horizontal yet again as she dove between two tall cloud-columns. Celestia gave chase, wings beating furiously as she moved straight ahead, making only minor adjustments to her course as she closed inexorably on Luna.

With a flourish, Luna spun in place, letting her inertia carry her forwards still, until she hit a cloud sideways – and stopped, standing on the cloud’s side as though it were solid ground. Celestia’s jaw dropped slightly at her sudden lack of motion – a feat that she was unable to duplicate as she collided and then plunged through a cloud, sheer speed overwhelming her ability to stand on it, soaking her mane and dress thoroughly as the ice particles that the cloud was composed collided with the heat of her body. She flapped her wings rapidly, eventually slowing down enough to bank and turn about, heading once more towards Luna, who was waiting a thousand feet back, having climbed to the top of the cloud.

Not once had Celestia truly come close to laying a hoof on Luna – each time it had looked like she was about to, she knew was merely because Luna had let her come so close. She expected a look of disappointment on the Princess’ face.

Instead, as she alighted atop a nearby cloud of her own, Luna was still wearing the same wry grin. “Thou art quite fleet of wing…” Luna proclaimed, “…for a feathered earth pony.”

“I…I am an alicorn!” she insisted.

“Thy voice does not contain a surfeit of confidence,” Luna stated, though her grin widened by a hair after a moment. “I am unkind. Thou art, in truth, a swift and strong flier…simply not a very agile one.” Her head tilted to the side somewhat. “Of course, thou art flying with a disadvantage.”

Celestia blinked a few times at that, before noticing that Luna was looking not directly at her, but rather the soaked-through dress she wore. While its weight was negligible, it was hardly the most aerodynamic outfit, especially now that it was soaking wet with cloud water. “Ah…” she noted. “I…thought it would be most appropriate if I…if I dressed for the occasion.”

Luna’s grin was replaced by a look of curiosity, though Celestia could tell that it was only an act. “Dress for the occasion?” she echoed. “But thou art my sister! That is thy claim, is it not? Wherefore would Celestia dress simply for a drawing of the night like any other?”

“It…it was like no other!” she proclaimed. “Never have I seen the stars dance in the sky so!”

Luna’s head tilted to the side. “That is untrue, ‘sister,’” she said. “Thou hast witnessed many such nights. Or…ah.” Her smile returned, this time a knowing one. “Thou dost not remember.”

Celesta grimaced. “N…no. I do not.”

“I would venture that thou remembers nothing of thy ‘past life,’” Luna pressed, wings beating a few times as she took to the air, then landed on Celestia’s cloud, with the still-rising moon behind her, casting a silvery halo around her body. Celestia idly wondered if Luna did that intentionally, or if it were mere coincidence. “One cannot help but wonder, therefore, what brings thee to believe that thou art Celestia reborn at all.”

Celestia stood tall, though even at her full height she still had to look up to Luna. “I am an alicorn,” she stated again. “I am Celestia, reborn. My adopted parents found me eleven months, to the day, from our battle, when thou banished me to the Sun.”

“Where Celestia yet remains,” Luna insisted.

Celestia closed her eyes, a smile of her own on her face. “Yea…and nay, sister. Thou made use of the Elements of Harmony. They consigned the madness and cruelty that had consumed me into the Sun – but I am what was left. All that was good in Celestia, I still am.”

“And what brings thee to this conclusion?”

Celestia opened her eyes, looking to Luna. “It is the one the Exarch of Cavallia, in collusion with all of his matriarchs and patriarchs, reached after much deliberation. What other conclusion could there be?”

Luna’s grin faded just slightly at that. “What, indeed?” she asked. She considered for a few moments. “Until I am sure, I shall call thee ‘Cadance.’”

“Cadenza,” Celestia corrected, before she could stop herself. Her eyes widened and she put a hoof to her mouth. “That is – I would prefer – but if thou wish – ”

“Peace,” Luna insisted, holding out a hoof. There was a moment of silence from the alicorn before she continued. “Thou shalt be Cadenza to me, then, until I am certain of thy claim.” Her grin dropped a moment later, replaced by a scowl, albeit one that lacked any true malice behind it, as she leapt back onto the cloud she had previously been occupying. “And I am disappointed in thee, Cadenza! I was right next to thee, I failed to call for a pause, but thou made no attempt to capture me! Didst thou never play ‘tag’ as a foal?”

Celestia blinked. “Wh…what?”

“I played it often with my sister, in ages past,” Luna reminisced. “There is a good chance, Cadenza, that tag is the oldest game – the first game. That, or hide-and-seek. Of course,” she smiled, “back then, my sister and I cared little for the passage of time. Our games could last for months – years – decades! The whole of the world was our playground!”

Surreality, thy name is Luna, Celestia thought, too stunned to consider the thought blasphemous. She had never expected to hear the Shepherd of the Moon, Vanquisher of the Sun, Mistress of the Star Beasts, and Sovereign of Equestria, reminisce about games of tag played in her youth, uncounted millennia ago. “I…” she eventually managed. “Yes. I played tag.”

“Well,” Luna said, stretching on the cloud and beating her wings a few times, though not taking to the air again. “Thou were not very good at it, I surmise. Perhaps a race instead, this time without thy agility being hampered by thy dress.”

Celestia bristled. She’d hoped that the subject had slipped Luna’s mind, but in hindsight it was foolish to believe that Luna ever forgot anything. “I…well. Thou art weighed down by thy regalia. ‘Tis only fair.”

Luna looked at her royal regalia: the black crown on her head, the chestplate hung from her neck, and the silver shoes around her feet. After a moment’s consideration, she blinked, and they simply disappeared from her person. She spun her fetlocks around and scratched at her neck with the alula of her wings. “There,” she said, then looked to Celestia. “I expect that thou art now out of excuses.”

The pink alicorn blinked a few times, before looking around. “Er…” she said. “I…have nowhere to store my dress? Which is, after all, really thine own…at least, I acquired it from my room in the castle…I do not wish to ruin it…”

Luna stared, waiting, as Celestia chewed her lip. Eventually, she let out a long sigh of resignation. “P…please, Princess, do not laugh…” she begged.

“Never,” Luna promised. After a moment, Celestia's horn glowed blue, and she began to remove the dress from her person. It took several minutes of fumbling with the various ties, clasps, and loops of the dress, but Celestia eventually succeeded in extracting herself from it. She managed to buy herself a few more seconds by shucking the shoes and necklace that had come with the garment, folding them up and into it…but at length, she saw Luna waiting patiently, and so – holding her breath and scrunching her eyes shut – she turned so that Luna could see her cutie mark. Or rather, her lack thereof.

The expected gasp of surprise or barely-contained snigger of derision didn’t come. Cautiously, Celestia opened one eye, and found that Luna, rather than staring at Celestia like the twenty-year-old-blank-flank freak that she was, had her eyes locked onto Celestia’s own, a warm smile on her face, though she said nothing.

Celestia looked to her flanks, then back to Luna. “The Exarch says that I will have my cutie mark when I raise the sun,” she explained. “That once I begin my celestial duties again, I shall be whole.”

Luna’s smile dropped into a concerned frown. “I sincerely hope that he did not use that phrasing,” he said. “Thou art whole, Cadenza. And my sister never raised the sun out of mere duty, just as I do not guide the moon and the stars simply because it is expected of me. A cutie mark is not some brand indicating thy role in the world. It is thy special talent – it is what makes thee happy. If bringing the golden light of the day is what does that – revealing the blue of the sky, warming the earth that plants may grow, regulating the passage of the seasons and the maternal clocks of mares that new life may be created – if that brings thee joy, then yes, the act of raising the sun, if thou art able, shall place its mark upon thee. But if it is otherwise…then it is otherwise. And there is nothing wrong with that.”

Celestia smiled at that. What Luna had said stood in stark contrast to the Exarch, who had impressed upon Celestia that a cutie mark was a mark of one’s role, passed down from the ethereal once one had found one’s place in the world. Celestia’s not having one yet, he had claimed, was simply the result of her needing to do the role she was reborn to do – to take stewardship of the Sun back from Luna, and once more guide it across the skies.

But between the Exarch – who, for all his wisdom and his age, was still just a mortal pony, one who likely wouldn’t live out a single century, let alone eons of time – and the immortal Luna, Celestia knew which one she trusted more to know about the way of the world. “Did it take thee as long to discover thy talent?” she asked.

Luna pursed her lips as she thought. “I don’t know,” she admitted. “Time was meaningless to me that long ago. Perhaps it took a day…perhaps a millennium…I cannot say.” She looked back down, to Celestia’s dress and accessories. In a flash of deep blue light, they disappeared, and Luna hopped into the air once more, settling down next to Celestia, stretching her wings. “Now then,” she said. “No more distractions. This is a test. We shall race. I shall challenge thee with wind, and rain, and lightning, and hail, and anything else I think of – and, if thou art able, thou shalt do the same to me. Thou shalt not utilize thy unicorn magic at all, only thy hooves and wings.”

Celestia nodded. “Where are we racing to?”

Luna grinned. “The island of Tambelon, in the Sea of Tranquility,” she stated, then drooped down into a ready position. Celestia did likewise, each alternating before staring straight ahead, and to each other. “Ready,” Luna intoned, her weight shifting from one hoof to another slightly, wings ruffling, “steady…go!”

Celestia kicked off from the cloud, and Luna did likewise, both spreading their wings wide as they charged forward into the night. Almost immediately, Luna veered off from a straight race to Tambelon, diving into the largest cloud in the bank, one that was hundreds of feet tall and thousands of feet wide. Celestia watched her dive, wondering what the Princess of the Night was doing, when the cloud darkened and began to crackle with electricity – and then move, chasing after Celestia, though slowly at first. Luna emerged from the cloud after a moment, eyeing Celestia, before beginning to spin in tight circles around it, right wing brushing it as she sculpted,  molded, and twisted the cloud. It began picking up speed, spiraling like a tornado after Celestia and swiftly closing the gap that she had managed to put between herself and Luna.

The cloud-twister seethed with lightning and howled with wind, as it began to create a vortex ahead of itself, drawing in the air – and pulling back Celestia, no matter how hard she struggled. She had just enough time to cry out in surprise before she was sucked into the cloud-twister.

Inside, it was loud, and dark, and chaotic. The cloud-twister was free of debris other than herself, of course, but the pink alicorn was nevertheless buffeted about as she tried to escape through the sides or forward. She initially though to just let herself be spat out the cloud-twister’s rear, but each time the howling winds brought her close, some new windstream would pick her up and toss her back into the twister’s center. And when she would reach the edge of the cloud-twister and try to plunge through, lightning would cackle and strike, warding her away.

Celestia panicked as her wings flailed uselessly against the howling dark. She had never flown in weather as bad as this, had barely ever flown in much more than a light drizzle, in fact. Her first thought was to call upon the magic in her horn to do something – amplify her weight, perhaps, making her too heavy to carry – but she then remembered the nature of this challenge.

Luna did not appear to be holding back. She still circled the cloud-twister, Celestia could see during her brief glimpses outside of it, doing barrel rolls around her creation as she continued to use her wings to keep the unnatural weather moving.

For the briefest moment, Celestia felt despair. But only a moment. Narrowing her eyes against the powerful gusts, she stopped trying to fight the winds, but instead spread her wings, seeking the currents that hurled her around and altering her course to fly along with them. She stopped flailing her wings, instead gliding along the interior of the wind storm, until she was gliding along its edges, her back to the twister’s interior and her legs tucked tightly against her barrel.

Idly, she supposed that, with so much spinning going on, she would have thrown up all that she had eaten today had she not been an alicorn. She wondered if Luna would accept that as further proof of her heritage.

Celestia was no longer flying about wildly, but nor was she free from her prison of wind and storm yet. Reaching out one leg, she let the keratin of her hoof touch the spinning cloud, though her leg trembled against the wind as she did so. Instantly on touching the cloud, Celestia could feel it, a sensation that shot from her hoof straight up her leg and to her wings, which she spread wide, stretching every feather to their limit as she reached down her other front hoof, plunging it into the cloud, willing it to disperse. She began to stomp at it with each hoof, poking holes, ruining its shape and structure. The twister began to tear itself apart…but then a shadow passed in front of Celestia, and the holes began repairing themselves, the wind outside of the twister serving to mold the cloud formation back into shape: Luna, safeguarding her creation as the howling winds seemed to pick up renewed strength, gliding along directly opposite Celestia on the other side of the twister.

Exactly where Celestia wanted her to be. Steeling herself for several seconds, she raised her wings high and then beat them down in a single swift motion, willing the wind they caught to be shoved forward and out of the twister.

The action threw her, of course, back into the dark winds. But the gust she created shoved a ten-foot hole into the clouds and threw Luna away from her creation as well. Celestia didn’t have time to see Luna’s reaction as the winds of the twister poured towards the gaping hole she had created in the clouds, the incredible volume forcing its way through and tearing the cloud apart in earnest now.

Celestia grinned brightly, spreading her wings wide and once again sending out another great gust, then another, blasting as many holes as she could in the twister, the chunks torn from the cloud instantly vaporizing once they were free from the magically-created-and-sustained weather construct. Celestia let out a whoop of excitement – until a jet-black, cackling cloud suddenly engulfed her, and her mane and hair stood on end despite herself. She realized what was happening just in time to dive from the cloud just as Luna gave it a firm buck with her hind hooves. 

The cloud flashed white as lightning coursed through it. Luna didn’t give it a second buck, as she saw Celestia had escaped. With a wide grin, she spun in place, pressed her front hooves against the cloud, and began chasing Celestia, striking the cloud on occasion and causing it to let out flashes of lightning and bangs of thunder. For the briefest moment, Celestia thought that she would out-fly Luna, but that was, of course, a foal’s dream, as Luna was swiftly upon her again. Celestia had little choice but to spin around and press all four of her own hooves to the cloud, pushing against it even as her wings beat frantically. The two alicorns slowed, then came to a complete stop in the air, Luna trying to envelop the cloud around Celestia, Celestia trying to disperse the cloud with her wings and hooves but failing as Luna’s own magic kept it in one piece.

Celestia forgot, for a moment, that on the other side of this small black cloud was the Princess of the Night. Pure instinct took over a she did the only thing she could think of: with Luna still pushing the cloud towards her with all her might, Celestia simply stopped doing likewise, letting herself fall into the storm cloud and kicking through it with her hind hooves.

The move was not quite enough of a surprise to stop Luna from striking the cloud firmly, causing lightning to arc through it and shock Celestia – she cried out in surprise and pain, though it wasn’t much, as a cloud of this size simply couldn’t produce enough lightning to seriously injure a pegasus, let alone an alicorn.

Celestia’s move was, however, enough to catch Luna off-guard, and Celestia felt her two hind hooves connect with something more solid than the cloud she was passing through even as it dawned on her that she was about to buck the Shepherd of the Moon, the Vanquisher of the Sun, the Mistress of the Star Beasts, the Sovereign of the Three Tribes, the Princess Luna Equestris.

Right in the face. Celestia gasped as she emerged from the other side of the cloud and saw Luna tumbling away for a few moments, before she flared her wings wide and stopped herself, one front hoof to her mouth and a look of utter surprise on the Princess' face. Celestia’s own hooves went to her own mouth in shock. “I…prithee, I am sorry, Princess! I just…got caught up…lightning…cloud…” her hooves flailed wildly, as though she were physically pointing out her excuses.

Luna lowered the hoof from her mouth, watching Celestia gesticulate helplessly. Her eyes were still wide in shock. “That…” she intoned. “That is it? That is all thee can muster when bucking?”

Celestia pressed her front hooves together. “Prithee, please do not destroy Cavallia for my affront, instead banish me to the Sun or the stars or…to the…wait. What?” She blinked a few times as she processed what Luna had said.

“I thought that thou grew up as an earth pony! Surely thou canst hit harder than that.” 

“I…well, I wasn’t really trying…” Celestia said, feeling stupid even as she did so.

Luna grinned. “I certainly hope not! Never fear, Cadenza, I did state that thou couldst make use of thy hooves, I did not specify that thou must restrict them to the shaping of clouds…and I gave thee leave to try and stop me in any way thou wished,” she said, before beating her wings a few times and returning to the same altitude as Celestia. “Shall we resume our race?” she asked. Before Celestia could respond, however, Luna took off.

---

As she flew, Luna couldn’t help but feel a little disappointment. She was fairly certain that she had, once again, left Cadance in the proverbial dust, probably with that same flabbergasted expression. It was quite a let-down that her – 

Blackness swallowed the princess, though that blackness was swiftly replaced by a bright flash of lightning as electricity coursed through Luna’s body. To Luna, who had experienced far worse in her vast lifetime than mere sparks of lightning striking her body, the pain was negligible. The far greater surprise was, as she passed through the black lightning cloud, the sight of Cadance soaring ahead of her and towards Tambelon. And most surprising was when Cadance looked over her shoulder, and stuck her tongue out at Luna, before shooting off.

Luna felt her heart swell at the sight, though after a moment she tempered it, putting more force behind each wing beat. For the moment, she forgot everything else – she forgot the pain of the past several centuries and especially the past few decades. She forgot the hard work and toil that awaited her back in Canterlot. She forgot her own still-lingering desire for wine in quantities that could kill a township and leave even an alicorn in a drunken stupor. And, she forgot to temper the feeling in her chest with the knowledge of what would happen come dawn.

No – for the moment, all that Luna was, was focused on Cadance.