//------------------------------//
// An Empty Room 
// Story: Book 1 - The Behemoth came to Canterlot 
// by Equimorto 
//------------------------------//

"You too?"
It was a simple question, one posed almost innocently. It still left Celestia at pause. "I..."
The pegasus turned towards her, curious, and amused. "Well? It's either yes or no, right?"
Celestia looked down. Down below past the puffy white clouds, towards the remains of what had used to be a city. "I can't honestly answer no. But I really do not wish to say yes, either." Something that looked like a smile but didn't feel like one curled her lips. "So I suppose I just choose not to answer."
"Why?"
Celestia was silent again, for a moment. She kept staring at the city in ruins, munching on nothing, deep in thought. Then her eyes turned upwards, towards the sky, and still for a second longer she was silent. And then she said, "Fear, I suppose. Not fear as one usually intends it, but a shade of fear nonetheless."
"Oh?" The pegasus' head tilted to a side. "And why is that? What is it?"
"I don't know." Celestia's answer was immediate this time, instinctual. Something she'd prepared for, ran in her head many times. "And I don't want to know. I've never tried, and I don't plan to." She looked at the pegasus. "You can see why, I'm sure. You can understand why I would be afraid."
"I can. But I have my doubts it will work forever, Celestia. It's not something you can ignore. The fact alone that you know it's there should tell you as much. You can feel it, and sooner or later it will come to the surface."
"Not if I have a say in it." There was a more prideful, authoritarian note in Celestia's tone, something she rarely used in her ruling days and even less so after passing on the crown. She sat a little straighter as she said that, her wings rigid and spread just a bit wider.
"I'm afraid you don't." The pegasus just rolled around, uncaring of the alicorn's display. "None of us did. It always just happened. How do you think you can stop it when you don't know what it is?"
"I can try."
"Try what? Try to do absolutely nothing? You can't. It will happen, Celestia, whether you like it or not. You're just delaying the inevitable."
Celestia looked away from the other, back towards the ground, and for a few moments she was silent again. Her long mane drifted along the light breeze around them, as the Sun she'd once used to move slowly made its way towards the horizon. Finally, after feeling the pegasus come to sit at her side, she broke the silence once more. "It's something strong. I can feel it. Whatever it is, it's powerful."
The only answer the other pony gave was a tap on Celestia's back with a wing, encouraging her to continue.
"I don't know. It could have been any other alicorn. It should have been any other alicorn."
"Feel like you're getting too old for this?"
Celestia didn't answer, that time. Something that felt closer to a smile curled her lips, and the two of them watched the Sun disappear behind the mountains in the distance.