Twilight wriggled a bit as she settled into her throne. Almost twenty years and she still hadn't gotten used to the thing, though admittedly some of that was her own expanding frame. At least the castle already came with Celestia-sized doorways; these days, visiting her friends called for a lot more spacial distortion than just the teleport.
Still, awkward throne or no, this promised to be a very good morning indeed, all thanks to one of the most powerful forms of friendship: delegation. The Great Wheel moved the sun and moon on schedule with no signs of developing self-awareness (and Twilight was prepared to befriend her creation when that day inevitably came,) the bureaucrats were handling the day-to-day functions of the kingdom, and the Eventide Court wasn't until, well, eventide. Even Spike was busy in Tartarus, keeping the demon lord Baphomet out of the prison through a combination of economic sanctions and Harmony-blessed cold iron.
Thus, for the first time in almost two years, Twilight actually had a hole in her schedule. She couldn't leave the throne, needing to be there if—okay, when—something came up, but she could summon a book from her chambers. She did just that with her human analogue's latest thaumological treatise, smiling as eagerly as when she did when reading under her covers by fillyhood hornlight after bedtime.
And just like when she was a filly, a voice piped up within moments of her actually opening the book. "Good morning, Your Royal Lavenderosity. Something very interesting just happened."
Twilight kept her groan internal through long practice. All she showed on the outside, even as she closed the book, was a serene smile. "Good morning, Discord. Office gossip?" A system with as many moving parts as the Canterlot bureaucracy was sure to have a few fall out of alignment, and Discord never failed to let her know about the more egregious ones.
But today, he just gave a dismissive wave of the paw. "Please. The most interesting antics your little functionaries get up to these days are some rather unsanitary uses for supply closets, and those are more Cadence's department than mine." He coiled around the throne, the better to whisper in her ear. "No, I think you'll be very interested in this. You see, Fluttershy found a gray hair this morning."
Twilight raised an eyebrow. "One of yours?"
"No. One of hers."
She waited. There was no sight gag, no sound effect, not even so much as Discord producing a visual aid. Just him looking at her and waiting for another horseshoe to drop. "Ah."
He drew back, scowling. "'Ah'? That's it?"
Twilight shrugged her wings. "Rarity's been going gray for almost twelve years now."
"Yes, and when she does it, it's hilarious." An illusory duplicate of Rarity appeared at the foot of the throne, wailing and thrashing in such exaggerated dismay that one could barely spot the single silver thread in her mane. Discord stomped it into smoke and loomed over Twilight, eyes glowing with madness. "But when the most important pony in my life starts showing signs of her body breaking down, it is legitimate cause for concern." With enough false sweetness that grains of aspartame leaked through the corners of his smile, he said, "So, not to put too fine a point on it, how is the plan going?"
Twilight gave the sort of gormless blink one could only learn from long association with Pinkie Pie. "The plan?"
"Yes. The plan." When Twilight's look of polite curiosity didn't shift, Discord continued. "The plan for ascension. The plan designed specifically to give your friends horns and wings as appropriate. The immortality plan."
"That plan?" Twilight said with mild interest.
Discord gritted his teeeth. "Yes. That plan."
"Ah. Just making sure." And with that, Twilight opened up her book.
The letters within twisted and twirled into a Haycartesian facsimile of Discord. "Twilight, this is the part where you answer my question."
"Uh huh." She turned the page.
Discord peeked out from the left edge of the text, shoving aside a scatter plot and sending its data points flying. "Is that 'Uh huh, the plan's in motion' or 'Uh huh, I need someone to turn my book into living gummy worms so I can focus on the actually important issue of my friends dying by inches'?"
Twilight sighed and looked up to see Discord waiting expectantly, forelimbs crossed and cloven hoof tapping against the ceiling. "It's 'Uh huh, I have a lot of responsibilities even with offloading many concerns onto my staff, and I could really use this all-too-precious moment of me time.' Rest assured, everything is proceeding on schedule."
"You know, you're taking your friends' slow slide into senescence much more casually than I would expect." Discord grabbed a fire pole and slid down to the floor with agonizing, squeaky slowness.
Twilight's ears flattened against her head, not entirely because of the noise. "I've had a lot of time to think about it."
Discord slapped a pointer into his open paw, then thwacked it against the blackboard now standing behind him. "Care to share your conclusions with the rest of the class?"
"Is the Spirit of Chaos and Disharmony really asking me to communicate clearly?" Twilight couldn't completely hold back her smirk. And she tried. Really.
"If nothing else, I want to be in on the joke. And preferably not standing in front of Fluttershy's grave in a scant few decades." Discord loomed over Twilight once more as whispering shadows crawled out from every corner of the room. "And I am prepared to endow her with the concentrated chaos of the Everfree if need be. I know what went wrong the last time I tried to make another draconequus."
Once Twilight felt she'd feigned sufficient interest in the theatrics, she said, "Do you think they're ready?"
"Ready?" A blink, and Discord's attempts at intimidation were gone. "Ready for what, ascension? What kind of question is that? It couldn't happen unless they were ready."
"As Cozy Glow demonstrated, there are methods that bypass that requirement, though they'd be easily undone and morally dubious. But I don't mean spiritual readiness. I mean psychological."
Discord gave that such a hard raspberry that whole jars of jam flew off of his tongue. "When has that ever mattered? By that metric, you weren't ready when Celestia sent you your unlabeled final exam. Cadence wasn't ready after Prismia, unless you think any fourteen-year-old can be emotionally prepared for becoming the avatar of love. And Sunset Shimmer most definitely wasn't ready when the vagaries of interdimensional harmony decided to slap a pair of wings on her two weeks after your coronation."
Twilight nodded. "And look at what happened afterwards. I spent the next few years consumed by self-doubt to one degree or another, Cadence hid in the castle for months, and Sunset screamed for an hour straight."
"Immediate value from that pegasus lung capacity, yes."
"Is it really so wrong to try to soften the blow?"
Discord scowled beneath his tie-dyed medical scrubs. "There's softening the blow, and there's not wanting to hurt your friends with the needle that will innoculate them against mortality." He squirted a bit of glowing fluid out of a syringe for emphasis.
Twilight gave a soft smile as she watched the slight tremors in the remaining liquid. "You really are afraid for her, aren't you?"
Discord crossed his forelimbs and harrumphed. "Frankly, I'm insulted that after all this time, you still sound surprised by that."
"With you, I can never be sure." The smile shifted to a smirk. "And I mean that as a compliment."
"Yes, yes, flattery all around. Now, which one of your little drones did you foist this task onto, anyway?" Discord unfolded an organizational chart that swiftly filled the throne room. "Or did you give Crepuscular Luminosity her mother's post-ascension notes to study while she's stuck in the Ponyville reeducation facility?"
Twilight slid a length of non-Euclidean bureaucracy off of her horn. "Luster Dawn is focusing on her friendship studies. And while we're speaking of families, I'll remind you you're not the only one worried about outliving loved ones."
Jazz music started, then immediately stopped, all so Discord could lower his cello in disgust. "Really? You of all ponies are going to start playing the immortality blues? I hope you appreciate the irony of letting your friends die so they don't have to watch the rest of theirs follow suit."
"Pinkie would outlive Mascarpone Quiche."
Discord raised a talon, paused, and scowled. "Bringing in Little Cheese is cheating."
"No, it's making a point you recognize as valid."
"I'm his godfather, and I say it's cheating."
Twilight raised her eyebrow in the traditional Apple family fashion. "I'm his godmother. What's your point?"
"Pinkie and Big Cheese may have been thinking a bit too literally when they assigned those titles to the local dei ex machinae." Discord tossed his halo into Twilight's, making both explode into golden sparks. "But that's besides the point. Thanks to your moonly meetups, your friends are already fulfilling the duties of alicorns as it is. This would just be a formality."
"A formality that will irrevocably separate them from their loved ones."
"It's called necromancy, Twilight. Literal necromancy." With a snap, Discord called forth a fluffy-haired phantom with a spectral flower in her mane, who boggled at both her summoner and the unfamiliar alicorn. He then dismissed her with a wave of his paw. "You don't have to make zombies, just talk to the spirits of the deceased. I know you know how; you've been through every part of the Archives at this point, no matter how restricted." He paged through a tome whose cover redefined "distressed leather." "And even if you hadn't, Starlight probably has a copy of the Neighcronomicon for bathroom reading."
"You realize I could make the same argument for after Fluttershy passes on."
"But it won't be the... same." Discord took a deep breath. "You've thought about this before."
Twilight nodded. "Both sides of the debate. Did you really think I wouldn't?"
"Only when this morning came along and Fluttershy was still distressingly and ever more emphatically mortal. I can't believe I'm going to say this, but please tell me you came to the..." Discord winced and gagged. "The rational decision."
"You mean ascension?"
"No, I mean petrifying them and then animating the statues as golems. Of course I mean ascension!"
Twilight brought a hoof to her chin. "You know, that's actually an intriguing alternative..."
Steam hissed out of every point of Discord's antler. "Twilight."
"Okay, okay." Twilight summoned another book and a quill, writing a note to herself. "I'm still considering that for Chrysalis's reformation. Maybe if she can finally feel what not being hungry is like—"
"You're seriously going to keep trying with those three?"
Twilight stared at him for a moment, mind going through the familiar feeling of reevaluating long-held beliefs. "Of course! Isn't that why you suggested petrification?"
Discord shrugged. "That was more spite than anything. I did figure there were good odds of you reforming them after defeating them when everything was going according to plan. There were even a few times where it seemed like they'd reform themselves. But after they stole my magic and didn't even bother using it, I was feeling more than a little vindictive."
"It's still a temporary solution. If my life has taught me anything, it's that imprisonment never lasts. I plan on finding something that will." Twilight held up a hoof. "Other than throwing them off of Canterlot."
"One time. I suggest that one time..." Discord shook his head. "So, coming back to saving our friends' lives?"
"Right. Well, I went through everything you have, but then I took the next step. You see—"
"Your Highness?" A green unicorn stallion in a burgundy robe poked his head through the throne room doors.
Discord's expression twisted into something indescribably horrific. Twilight flared out enough harmonious energy to radiate a faint rainbow aura until he rolled his eyes and relaxed. "Yes, Writing Desk?" she said to her majordomo.
Writing Desk, to his credit, didn't even blink an eye at the brief clash of titans a few ponylengths in front of him. "You asked for a reminder half an hour before your eleven o'clock meeting at the Castle of the Two Sisters."
"Oh! Excellent timing." Twilight rose from her throne. "Discord, could you help me round up the girls? We all wanted to—"
Discord snapped. Twilight found herself standing just in front of the palatial Treehouse of Harmony, along with the rest of the Council of Friendship mid-several-activities. He caught a near-sonic Rainbow Dash in a butterfly net and said, "Done. Now you get to explain to all of them why you're dragging your hooves on helping them live forever. Or you can confess that you've given up entirely and just plan on kicking the can until they all kick the bucket."
The others laughed at that, to Discord's visible confusion. Twilight took the opportunity to rinse the suds out of Rarity's coat.
"So ya finally realized we ain't gettin' any younger, huh?" said Applejack, who slung the broom she'd been using over her withers.
Discord simmered. A skillet of peppers and onions crackled atop his head in merry contrast. "It may have crossed my mind, yes."
"I didn't want to bring it up; I knew it would upset him," said Fluttershy. She moved to Discord's side; they shared an sad smile as he sent the bag of animal feed back to the sanctuary. "But, well, we found a gray hair this morning."
"Gasp!" Rarity gasped. She swept a foreleg over Fluttershy's withers. "I have been waiting for this moment. Rest assured, darling, I've found the perfect blend to make it seem like you're not a day over twenty."
"Ooooor you can just borrow some of my pink!" Pinkie held out a glass. Twilight told herself it was just pink lemonade and not anything more fundamental.
Dash peeked over the rim of the net. "I don't wanna sound old, but I am not young enough to think pink straight from the source is a good idea."
Applejack rolled her eyes. "That ain't old, Rainbow, it's jus' good sense."
"Yeah, have you met me?"
"Professors!"
All eyes turned up to see a variety of shapes descending upon them: A dragon, a changeling, a hippogriff, and a griffon. Turning to the bridge revealed a waving earth pony and a yak who took one look at the non-yak construction, backed up several paces, and took a running leap across the chasm.
Twilight countered Discord's alteration of the landing site without even bothering to check what he did.
"I was going to catch her."
"Of course you were."
Regardless, Yona landed without incident, as did the rest of the School of Friendship alumni. The next few minutes were spent in warm greetings and hugs, with varying degrees of feigned reluctance.
"How'd you beat us here?" said Sandbar.
Smolder rolled her eyes. "Duh. Discord's right there."
"Making me look bad," Gallus muttered.
Silverstream smiled and elbowed him in his unarmored side. "You're worse than Terramar, you big grumpus. Relax! You're not on duty."
That got more of a smile out of him than Twilight could manage most days. "If you're trying to get me to change, comparing me to the hero of Basalt Beach isn't how to do it."
"Spoken like somecreature who's never had to tell Aunt Novo what to get him for his Freedom Days gifts."
Twilight shook her head and turned to Ocellus, who was all but vibrating with enough energy to resemble Pinkie Pie without shapeshifting. "You don't have to call us professors anymore, Ocellus. You've all graduated and none of us have done more than give guest lectures at the School for years. If anything, we should be calling Silverstream professor!"
Ocellus looked away, though she still smiled. "It's how I first got to know all of you, and you made us all the creatures we are now. It's hard to think of you any other way."
"Look, this is all very sweet," said Discord, "but I must ask what was so incredibly important that it interrupted our earlier conversation."
Everyone looked up at him, some hiding their amusement better than others. "You haven't looked around, have you?" said Yona, relishing her mastery of Ponish pronouns.
Discord only then seemed to register the extra stories the Treehouse had grown over the years, to say nothing of the spikes of harmony crystal poking out of the pillar of earth supporting it, hinting at how its roots had infiltrated the old castle's cellars and dungeon before going deeper still.
"Oh. Well, that's different." He turned back to the gates of the Treehouse and stroked his goatee. "Did you gain weight recently?"
"Discord! Really!" cried Rarity. "One does not say such things of a lady. Even if that lady is a building."
Twilight led the way inside. "We're here because the Tree of Harmony has recovered enough to produce new Elements for the new Bearers."
"Ah." Discord followed along, watching the other creatures come inside with an expression so sour his head turned into a lemon. "So you're giving that up too?" he said, spitting juice everywhere.
An illusory image of a much younger Twilight manifested in front of them. "It is only right that I bestow them on those who restored me."
"Even while you mimic the appearance of your old Bearer of Magic." Discord plucked his head off his shoulders, ate it, and stuck out his tongue. "And they call me tasteless."
The two alicorns traded a knowing smile. Learning about the Spirit of Harmony had been more than a little bizarre at first, but now it was like having another para-sister, as spiritually inclined as the human Twilight was intellectually. "Are you ready?" said the corporeal Twilight.
"I simply need the new Bearers beneath the central dome. That is where I will fruit."
"Take it from the voice of experience, Sparkle Sparkle, you went to seed long ago."
The spirit and the young Bearers-to-be paid Discord no heed. Instead, the six went into the central chamber of the Treehouse, big enough to host the Gala even after Pinkie Pie had been given free rein to make confetti of the old traditions. Shapes etched themselves into the top of the crystalline dome even as the onlookers watched, forming into an elaborate mandala of sixfold symmetry. Within lay suggestions of each of their species, each of their virtues, each of any number of concepts that had no name, no form, or neither. A rainbow of magic seethed within, building and brightening as the shape took form.
Finally, the etchings folded opened like a flower, and six shining lights descended from them. Each settled on a graduate's throat, then all six flared to blinding intensity.
Once everyone had blinked the spots out of their eyes—or, in Discord's case, tweezed them—each of the new Bearers sported a golden necklace set with with a brilliant cut crystal that matched their eyes.
The spirit of Harmony smiled. "It is done."
Twilight nudged Discord with a wing as the other old Bearers raced forward to congratulate their successors. "Admit it. You're glad you saw this."
He rolled his eyes and blew plaid smoke out of his nostrils. "Yes, yes, a very touching ceremony commemorating the inevitability of change as the Tree produces a new batch of weapons of mass affection. On that note, what's what?"
"I have no idea. The old Elements weren't the virtues of the Pillars. With the Tree taking on a new form, the Elements almost certainly have as well." Twilight sighed as she watched her friends chat with one another. "As much as I'd love to research them, it's not my place. It's up to the ones who will use them to discover the specifics."
"As long as Laughter and Kindness didn't mutate too much. I'm all for reinvention, but there's something to be said for sticking with what works."
"And what if the replacement works even better?"
Discord hesitated as he thought about that. Then his eyes focused properly on Twilight again, and he frowned in further contemplation. "I figured you'd have a happy glow when the ever-so-jagged Treehouse of Harming Knees finished healing up, but I didn't think it would be that literal."
Twilight couldn't help but smile. "Yeah, about that—"
And then, for the second time in her life, she vanished in a burst of pure, harmonious energy.
When Twilight returned to the Material Plane, quite the scene lay before her. The School of Friendship alumni stood on one side, the spirits on the other. The new Elements flickered fitfully on their Bearers' throats, their united will struggling against Harmony's own.
Also, there was a lot of shouting, enough that it had reached the point where every creature was trying so hard to be heard that none of them were.
Applejack whistled louder than any of them, nodding in satisfaction as they all turned to face the Council. Rarity discreetly got her hat and neckerchief back on her. "Now all y'all hush. What's with th' bellyachin'?"
Absolute silence and seven dropped jaws answered her. Twilight and the Spirit of Harmony exchanged a wink.
"Pretty sure they though Discord offed us while they were distracted," Dash said as she slipped back into her bomber jacket. "Dang, this thing already feels a little small."
"Perhaps I can finally convince you to be rid of the foul thing?" Rarity said, perhaps just a bit too eagerly. "Or donate it to Scootaloo? Wash it at the very least?"
"What part of 'lucky jacket' do you not understand?"
Slowly, the onlookers... well, didn't speak, per se, but certainly made assorted shocked noises. Gallus, easily the most collected out of all of them, looked around, sighed, and said, "I'm going to have to say it, aren't I?"
"How in Equestria are all of you alicorns now!?" Discord said as if on cue. "And why did Twilight shrink!? I don't think you're even eye-level with Luna anymore!"
Twilight smiled. Any surreptitious glances to make sure her mane still flowed in an unfelt breeze—which it did—were purely in the mind of the viewer. "We've gone through a lot together."
Pinkie giggled. Her mane and tail had not only retained their contents in the trip to the Astral Plane but had already begun expanding further, almost visibly. "There's an understatement." She flapped her wings, leapt, and promptly ate dirt. "Aww..." She then got lift by spinning her tail like a pedalothopter rotor and crossed her forelegs. "This is gonna take a while."
Twilight did her best to ignore that. "Poison joke curses, dark magic, cutie mark swaps, cutie mark removal, more forms of magic loss than I like to think about... There was a reason everypony looked ten years older than they should."
"I do beg your pardon, darling." Rarity tossed her mane, which still had a streak of silver in it, but a much thinner and more fashionable one.
Twilight held up her forehooves. "Hey, I looked even older! I shouldn't have been that huge for centuries. My point is that our adventures were rough not just on our bodies, but our souls. If it weren't for the splashback from all the friendship rainbows, we'd probably be in even worse shape." She sighed and took in her friends, who looked younger and more vibrant than they had for an uncomfortably long time. "And the amount of power the Elements needed to fix even the relatively minor damage I took before completing Starswirl's Unfinished Spell only hurt everypony else more in the process."
"Th' world needed you first, sugarcube," said Applejack, jerkily spreading a wing across Twilight's withers. "Ain't no harm done in the end."
After a nuzzle—one kept entirely friendly under Rainbow Dash's watchful eye—Twilight continued. "Sombra shattering the Elements didn't help at all. The feedback damaged all of us on a metaphysical level that the mortal pony body can't repair." She turned to Discord. "So while they were certainly all worthy of ascension, their souls were too scarred to actually do it. And our connections to one another meant that all the power that should have gone to them ended up in the one alicorn among us."
"Which is why you grew super-huge, super-quick!" Pinkie's mane puffed out even further. For one delirious moment, Twilight thought she was swimming in a sea of pink frizz. She told herself it had just been an involuntarily cast illusion.
"It's a very good thing Celestia and Luna made nothing but crowns and regalia de rigueur for princesses," Rarity said as she took in her wings. "You'd have bankrupted the nation trying to keep a full wardrobe stocked as you shot up."
Sandbar spoke up. "So... us getting the new Elements unblocked everypony?"
Dash rolled her eyes. "That and years of weird medical crystal-incense-chakra stuff Twilight put us through."
"It seemed bogus at first, but Zecora verified Tree Hugger's regimen." Twilight gave Dash a smirk. "Besides, are you really complaining?"
"Of course not! Rainbooms were starting to get hard again." Dash did a few quick loop-the-loops "Now I feel like I could do five in a row!"
"Please don't," Fluttershy murmured. "The manticores might see it as a threat display."
Discord grabbed his jaw off the floor, reattached it, and approached her as though he was afraid she'd blow away. "Fluttershy? I'm not dreaming any of this, am I?"
She smiled at him and put a hoof over his heart's last known location. "You aren't."
He hugged her. No gags, no magic, just a sincere embrace. "Thank goodness. Thank chaos."
"Thank Harmony?" Harmony suggested. "I was the one who told Twilight about this when I detected the spiritual detritus in the others."
"Yes, fine, you too." After a few moments, Discord stiffened and pulled out of the hug. "Wait. When did you tell her?"
"About fifteen years ago."
"Fifteen..." Discord whirled on Twilight. "You've been planning this practically since you plopped your purple patoot on the throne!?"
She nodded. "And that argument we had today? I had the same one with myself for five years after she told me."
"So why repeat it with me?"
Twilight gave him a flat look. "You don't have the best track record with appreciating how actions have consequences. I wanted to make sure you appreciated the magnitude of this decision." Her gaze drifted about the Treehouse. "Especially since today was the one big opportunity, the chance that would let them all either live forever or go where I can't anymore. And when I'd talked myself in circles, Spike helped me see the next step."
"Oh, do tell," said Discord, resting his head on curled talons.
"I'd spent so long thinking about what I should do, how I could fix my problem. But I wasn't the one whose life was being indefinitely extended. It wasn't my choice." Twilight turned to her friends. "So I asked them."
"Weren't easy, neither," said Applejack. She doffed her hat. "But we ain't strangers t' loss."
"Granny Pie and Nana Pinkie."
"Uncle Blaze."
"Poor Sassy."
"Two thousand three hundred seventy-eight little friends."
"An' we all talked it over with those we'd be leavin' behind. We may not have the Elements anymore, not even a touch, but whoever we asked agreed."
"Princess Twilight needs you," said Gallus.
"The world needs you," added Yona.
Fluttershy flapped to Discord's eye level, careful of her horn as she nuzzled him. "You need us."
"It was at once humbling and incredibly flattering," said Rarity. "No creature could bear the idea of an Equestria without us. We've become icons of the realm, as it were."
"And sure, one day the accrued temporal and logical pardoxes of our adventures will force the universe to reset and some of our tribes may shift in the process, but until then?" Confetti burst into the air all around Pinkie. That, at least, was a familiar phenomenon. "We can live it up for eternity!"
"And help rule Equestria," said Twilight.
Applejack waved that off. "'Course. We was already doin' that. Now we just have t' wear crowns while we do it."
"Oh my gosh, quintuple coronation!" cried Silverstream. After a moment, she shuddered. "Oh, Aunt Novo's going to blow bubbles when she hears about this..."
"The political ramifications will certainly be... interesting." Twilight smiled and spread her wings over her friends as much as she could. They followed suit. "But I know this is the beginning of an even brighter future for every creature."