Twin Suns

by Feynna

Chapter 015 - Fall from Grace.

It has been ninety-five years since we started raising and lowering the twin suns and the moon. Discord was only a bad memory by now and that prophecy Clover made was all but forgotten. Tia and I had just celebrated our one-hundred and seventeenth birthday, a number I would have previously thought utterly ridiculous, to be honest.

Almost a hundred years raising and lowering the sun, my sun, each and every day of the year. If Starswirl was still here with us, he would be proud. I had long since given up on finding out what happened to our mentor, losing hope of ever seeing him again. He was simply gone with no hints at all about what happened to him.

So much had changed since the early days of Equestria, since we first started to rule this nation. Since we picked up the mantle of upholding the day cycle. Time just continued on cruelly, taking away pony after pony that we called friends. Even Night Fang was gone now, having given her life for her job without even a single bit of hesitation, keeping this land safe. She didn’t even have a foal to carry on her legacy.

I’m such a sentimental old mare now, aren’t I? A hundred and seventeen years old, and many more centuries would follow of losing mortal ponies while we stayed eternally young. Well, I always was sentimental, 'being old' and 'acting my age' was still up for debate. When cookies were involved, I still behaved like a little filly with her hoof stuck in the cookie jar.

Yu’la, thankfully, was still as youthful as ever, not having grown at all. As was the case with Philomena, Celestia’s phoenix (more or less, she was very much a free spirit in the sense of not listening to us). That bird has gone through a few of her life cycles by now, though. It is always quite the sight to behold as she bursts into flames and rises from her ashes a moment later (she really gets cranky and misbehaves a lot right before it, much to my chagrin).

What else has changed? Let’s see... hmm. Our kingdom has finally fully recovered in every way from Discord’s mad reign. Many things have been improved for our little ponies (quite the literal statement by now with our height). Things like medicine and living standards were the most prominent things that have seen a big improvement. By my sun, I was so glad our ponies had better hygiene now.

The majority of those pesky dark artifacts had also been rounded up by now, too. It was still a mystery to us from where they originated from. New ones popping up were a rarity by this point, a great relief to me and my wives. The less we had to worry about those, the better.

Our ponies were happy and content, perhaps the best improvement of them all. The nobles finally started to take Luna and me more seriously, too. No longer were we the ‘lesser’ princesses, a mindset that had persisted for far too long after Platinum was finally gone from the picture.

It was strange, looking back at what a nuisance she had been to us. It was aggravating at the best of times, but now? Without her trying to undermine us at every opportunity? I had no idea how to feel about her death. For some reason... I always thought we would continue with this squabbling, that it would find no end. A (somewhat, but not really) friendly rivalry (or more like an antagonistic tug of war) where we expressed our disdain for each other in petty pranks and shadow warfare.

I did regret never reconciling with the estranged former princess, trying to teach her a better way. On the one hoof, it was probably better like this. She never could get over us being the rulers of Equestria, always trying to sabotage us in a misguided attempt at revenge. But then again, on the other hoof? Despite her indirectly causing the death of our mother by going behind the back of her father’s wishes to not force anypony to lend their magic for the ritual to move the heavens, despite her overwhelming selfishness and pettiness... if only she tried, she could have been a shining example of what unicorns could be, not unlike her father.

Maybe if she had cast aside her misgivings, she could have been a friend. It was sad that the light of friendship eluded her so. To live in misery, in sadness... in darkness... it reminded me painfully of what Sombra turned into. Had Platinum been half as powerful as the mad stallion, she might have deliberately taken somepony dear to my heart away from me as he did. Not that time didn’t already do that by itself...

Still... Platinum didn’t deserve such a painful death, dying in her own home as it burned to cinders around her. The magical fire that consumed the far too fortified home of the bitter former princess suddenly sprang up one night not too long after her surprising return from the Dragonlands after Discord’s reign was over. The old mare had no chance to escape, locked into her own home that would become her fiery tomb.

While I was feeling slightly guilty for feeling relief to know that she couldn’t have possibly survived the fire, my sisters were... celebrating her death. I could (somewhat) understand their enthusiasm, but... it felt wrong to me. To celebrate somepony’s death... I couldn’t do that. It was disrespectful, even though she didn't deserve an ounce of sympathy from me.

Sure, she had been responsible for a lot of grief in our family, even for Equestria as a whole... but that doesn’t mean we have to gloat about her death. While she didn’t show any kind of remorse for all the ponies she forced into losing their magic, she did try to help the world, misguided as it was. I mean... she did what she could with what was available to her at the time and after having ruled for such a long time... I could understand what a heavy burden it was to make such decisions.

A part of me resented her for having taken our mother away from us, anyway. A part of me wanted to dance on her grave and throw insults at her. A part of me wanted her to burn for eternity in the darkest corners of the afterlife. But I couldn’t let those dark feelings control me, lest I start down a path with no return. I needed to strive to be better than that.

It was tempting, though... to join my sisters in their celebration. We could finally breathe easy with her gone, that much I felt like I could agree to ‘celebrate’. That’s as far as I was willing to go with that, though, because celebrating her death in itself just didn’t feel right. Celebrating death never felt right.

I knew that, as alicorns, we represented life and death in equal parts. That didn’t mean I had to cherish it. Death is something to be accepted, not celebrated. Not in a malicious way, anyway. Tia and Lulu knew that as much as I did, so it was a little bit unnerving to see them be delighted with the death of Platinum. I couldn’t fault them for that, though, after everything the former princess had done to us. I just hoped they wouldn’t get into the habit of celebrating every death of those ponies that would or had become a nuisance to us at one point or another.

I’d rather leave such bitterness behind us and focus on the good things. Things that we could look forward to in the future and actually celebrate without having to feel guilty afterward.

Aside from Platinum and all the ponies lost to Discord’s chaos, Equestria recovered remarkably swiftly from the decline in population. Our nation saw a rise in newborn foals that has never been seen before like that in the history of ponykind. Herding had become especially popular recently, something that warmed my heart immensely to see so many new families living their lives happily together with their loved ones, forgetting the hardships Discord put us all through. That, and bisexuality was becoming (more or less) the accepted norm among society as ponies opened up to their feelings.

It wasn't that hard to realize that all sexualities had one thing in common: love is love, no matter the form it takes on. And when life is so fleeting and anything could take it away at a moment's notice, you learn to cherish those moments without denying your heart what it wants (as long as it was being kept consensual and age-appropriate).

Nopony has to feel ashamed of their desires, whether it be romance or naughty time. Or even the complete lack of such desires. Friendship is its own kind of magic, after all. Everypony deserved a piece of happiness and nopony could deny them that. Well, unless it was incest, there was still a heavy stigma behind that and I wasn't inclined to meddle with my ponies' opinion of that. Much as I would like to stop hiding my feelings for my wives, there was just too much baggage to work through in order to make it work and be accepted in society.

Not to mention, the risks of a sibling union's pregnancy was far more than just birth defects from similar genes (even though Celestia assured me those risks would be minimal for first-generation incest). No, the main risk of incest among ponies came from magic, as we found out.

The more closely a magical core resembles the core of the partner, the more likely it would become that the magic core of the newborn would become unstable. It does sometimes happen in regular pregnancies, too, but those were more of a one-in-a-million chance of happening in comparison to an almost fifty percent chance of something going wrong with incest.

Tia was, of course, trying to find out how ponies could have ever survived ancient times to the point where evolution and pony tribes became what they are now. Things like incest were, more or less, a common occurrence among primitive ponies (or so she told me, making comparisons to humans during their tribal, nomadic lifestyle thousands of years ago). The only thing I could come up with was that magic was less tame during those times and that ponies tamed it over the span of several thousand years, which now led to the problem of magic surges being hella dangerous to newborns and foals.

Ah, well... that was just one mystery among many things we still had next to no idea about. The very nature of magic was still mysterious in and of itself. But that was one of the things we made an effort to educate ourselves on (as well as our subjects). And I was even more proud to say that our ponies got increasingly more interested in education.

Gone were the days when it was a privilege only for the rich and the nobles, a thing my wives and I welcomed with open arms. Knowledge was a basic right I felt should be available to anypony regardless of heritage. And for that matter, the nobles were hard-pressed in finding ‘good’ arguments against making education available to the common ponies. It basically boiled down to them throwing a tantrum over losing their 'privileges' like those right-wing conservative idiots were wanton to do.

Haah. Politics. Gotta love dealing with supremacists. Not.

It had taken a lot of effort to whittle down their conviction that it was something that should be 'exclusive' to those of noble descent, and with the masses seeking to educate themselves, it was almost too easy to get them to agree to the change. While they were reluctant at first, they did agree that it was for the betterment of Equestria and their own purses (since ponies that knew what they were doing worked more efficiently, the nobles were all too happy to take advantage of that).

With all those things making our ponies happy, we were happy. Nothing could have taken our happiness from us. Everything was perfect the way it was and I was certain it would have stayed that way if the universe would have decided to give us that peace and fortune.

The universe, on the other hoof, was a harsh mistress. Fate had other plans in mind for us and I got my first taste of that as I felt my twin toss and turn in her sleep in the middle of the night.

Dragged out of sleep, I looked around tiredly in the darkness before I tapped into my alternate eyes. My vision sharpened considerably, the dark world around me becoming a little bit clearer, enough so that I could make out what was what even from across the room.

“Tia?” I mumbled, shaking her slightly. Luna also turned her head around with bleary eyes, giving Celestia a questioning gaze before realizing that she was having a nightmare. With a quick burst of her magic, she woke our sister up from the hell her mind was plaguing her with.

Celestia awoke with a scream, looking around wildly like a frightened animal and I laid a gentle hoof against her side in concern. Her head whipped around to face me and all I could see in her eyes was pure, unadulterated terror. “S-stay away from me!”

“...what?” I asked, thoroughly confused as my wife scrambled away from us, falling off the edge of the bed with a yelp. “Tia! What is going on? What did you see?!”

“I... I have to get away from you,” she said, taking panicked breaths as she failed a few times to get back on her trembling hooves. “I-I can't... I can’t stay near you!”

“What in Tartarus are you saying, sister? Has the cake finally driven you mad?” Luna questioned, hopping out of bed after her, only for Celestia to flinch away from her and run for the balcony. I tried to erect a barrier, but my twin shot it with a dispel, causing me to let out a gasp, disoriented.

“I won’t hurt you, not like that, have to get away...” Celestia muttered crazedly, Luna jumping on her and pinning her to the ground. That didn’t prove to keep our sister contained for long, though. Celestia struggled for a moment before she flung Luna back towards our bed. Not even a second after that and she was back to fleeing towards the balcony. 

Luna and I got tangled up in the covers of our bed, and just as we freed ourselves from the sheets, we saw Celestia take flight. Luna gave a panicked whinny, scrambling to catch up with her and I wasn’t very far behind.

“Sister!” we cried out, confused and scared for what had gotten our wife in such a frenzy to get away from us. The nagging feeling in the back of my mind returned, forgotten warnings trying to push themselves back into the foreground of my thoughts.

Celestia continued on, beating her wings furiously, growing more distant from us by the second. Luna and I couldn’t even keep up with her when she really wanted to start gaining speed. Luna might come close, but I was already straining my wings for all that they were worth to not lose either of them from my sight. That's what I get for not exercising my wings enough, ugh.

A flash of light was the only thing that told us we would never catch up with Celestia (at least, not anytime soon). She had teleported away. Not far, as we could still see a small dot in the distance, but even that was gone after a moment of her charging up the spell again. Her casting speed was unparalleled, even with such demanding spells like teleportation.

Once more, I cursed myself for not practicing more, especially with such a useful spell. I swore to myself to remedy that deficiency as soon as I could. I would get better at it, so much so that not even Tia could keep up with me. The next time she runs away, she won't get far. Not on my watch.

Alas, for her to be able to run away again, we would first have to find her. Luna wanted to keep on chasing her, but after an hour of finding nothing, she came back to the cloud I was staying on, breathing heavily in exhaustion. We had flown and teleported across half the nation in our attempt to bring our frightened sister back home. And all of it was for nothing, she was gone.

“What has gotten into her?” she whispered and I whimpered, tears spilling from my eyes. She began to soothingly rub my back with a hoof as I clung to her desperately, not wanting to be left completely alone.

“Why?” I sobbed, sniffling loudly as my breath came out in short, irregular, sporadic gasps. Luna made a few hushing noises and I continued to bawl my eyes out into her coat. “Why would she run from us?!”

“I don’t know, Sunny,” Lulu answered, her voice wavering. She remained strong, though. Most likely for me. “I wish I knew. She was afraid of hurting us, but what could have spooked her so much to think she would actually do so?”

“Do you think it's about that prophecy?” I asked, my voice barely audible.

“Prophecy?” Luna asked back, momentarily confused before she remembered. She tensed up, holding me tighter to her. “Damn her for running away like that. We all agreed that nothing could happen if we don’t let it happen in the first place.”

“Maybe... maybe we thought about it in the wrong way,” I whimpered. “What if we didn’t have a choice about it?”

Luna frowned as she looked down at me with a glare. “What do you mean, Summer?” she growled. “Are you suggesting that this is going to happen no matter what?!”

“I... I don’t know,” I answered, withdrawing slightly from her. My wife sighed, calming herself and motioning for me to elaborate further. I gathered my jumbled thoughts, considering every word I remembered from the prophecy off the top of my head. “The prophecy, it never explicitly said who betrays whom, right?”

“Yeah...” Luna nodded, giving me a suspicious look.

“What if... what if it was never one of us?” I said, biting my lower lip in worry. Luna stared at me like I had just grown a second head and I suppose I should have worded that a bit more clearly. It seems Starswirl had managed to rub off on us with the cryptic answers he always gave. “I mean, what if it is somepony else that would force us to betray the others?”

“That is ridiculous,” Luna snorted, rolling her eyes. “No mere mortal can just 'command' us to do something. Nor would Celestia play willingly into their hooves by running away from us. But then again... I don’t want to entertain the idea of one of us willingly betraying the others. She must have seen something out of context... but what?”

I gave Luna a severe look, mustering up all the strength my faltering courage could manage. “We need to find Celestia. Now.”

“Right, but how?” Luna asked and I smiled, poking her necklace. The one I had made so long ago now, able to send us to each other. Luna returned my smile as she placed her hoof over it, speaking Celestia’s name loud and clear.

Luna remained where she was, right in our embrace. She gave me a confused look and I took hold of my own necklace, saying her name with fear. Although, once more, nothing happened. My frightened eyes met Luna’s own. “Why... why won’t it work?”

“I don’t know!” I shot back, trying again and again as I started to panic. “It should bring us to her while she is within reach!”

“How far is that?” she asked, a feeling of horror starting to set in within her expression.

“Luna, everywhere in the damn solar system!” I growled, getting desperate. “The only way for it to not work would be if she was dead, outside our solar system, in a different time to our own, within a magic nullification barrier, or if she isn’t wearing her necklace in the first place!”

My sister shifted against me, nervous. “What are the chances of that?” she asked me and I snorted. I started listing off that it was next to impossible that she just got killed randomly (even though that happened already once in our lives...), that we had no way of actually leaving the solar system or our timeline (at least, as far as I was aware... well, actually, she could have used a mirror portal for all we know), and that a magic nullification barrier was nothing more than a myth, a damn theory. “Aren’t the runes Mom had used to keep us within our rooms during estrus magic nullification barriers?”

“No,” I sighed, rubbing my head tiredly. “Those are wards, meant to stop you from completing the spell if it had the intended effect of leaving the specified area in the first place. A magic nullification barrier would actively or passively negate all attempts at magic, including teleporting in or out of a specified area. You wouldn't even be able to begin casting a spell without excruciating pain.”

My sister gave me a blank look before shrugging. “Still sounds like what Mom had used,” she said and I groaned in exasperation. “But 'apparently' there is a difference. If it isn’t that, what if... what if she doesn’t have her necklace with her?”

“Lulu, we wear those everywhere we go,” I said, pointing out that we even wore them when we went to bed. Heck, we even wear them while taking a bath! “She would never leave it behind.”

“Except when she doesn’t want to be followed...” she shot back and I felt my ears press themselves down to the back of my head. Could she really have taken the necklace off? Even in her panic? I tried to remember the moments leading up to this moment, reconstructing the scene in my mind as clearly as I could.

Celestia woke up after Luna used her magic to bring her out of her nightmare, she panicked about keeping us away from her so that she wouldn’t hurt us, fell down from the bed, and tried to get back on her hooves as fast as possible. Something about that wasn’t right, though. There was a difference there, and, as I examined that moment again, I bolted from the cloud in a rush to get back to our castle, more specifically, our bedroom.

"Hey! Summer! Wait!” Luna shouted after me and I gave her enough time to catch up with me, although she would have caught up nonetheless. She was faster than me, after all. “What is it? What has you in such a rush all of a sudden?”

“I think she purposefully fell down from the bed,” I answered while pushing my wings to their limit, exhausted as they were from the earlier chase. Still, I persevered through the burn of my muscles being worked far more than I ever put them through in an effort to return home as fast as possible. “She did that to take off her necklace at the same time!”

“Are you sure?” Luna asked and I nodded, the desperate denial within me quickly losing the fight against what I was certain must have happened. 

The flight home took an eternity within my mind, thoughts racing to and fro about what we should do to get Celestia back. I wanted to go out and search for her all day and night until I had her back where she belonged, but that would be next to impossible, wouldn’t it? Tia was an expert in magic, she had enough knowledge about spells to hide away even the faintest sign of her presence from us.

There were so many places that she could hide in where magic wouldn’t even be able to help us, each one incredibly vast in its own right. If she truly thought of hiding in another reality, we would never find her. Searching through every world Starswirl’s old mirrors connected to would be an absurd task, not to mention the possibility that she might have gone through the prototype mirror, instead. I dearly hope she didn’t consider hiding away in the multiverse, I couldn’t take that possibility.

Back in our bedroom, my fears came true. Right there, down on the ground at the edge of our bed, was her necklace, discarded haphazardly during her hurry to escape us. My legs got weak and I fell down, beginning to weep as the reality of the situation got all too real for me. She was gone.

My shining Yellow Sun left me.

She was gone and we had no way to track her, no way to reach her with her actively hiding from us. Luna came up beside me, throwing a wing over my back as we cried together. We cried in despair as we realized we couldn’t simply call out to her and have her come back home. All the while, Luna made reassuring noises in an attempt at calming me down.

It didn’t help, the reassuring words that we would somehow find a way to get Tia to see sense. It only managed to drive me further into despair, wailing my pain to the heavens. Celestia had abandoned us in a misguided endeavor of sparing us from whatever vision she had seen.

She hadn’t abandoned us in the sense of betrayal, but out of loyalty. Tia thought that, for her to be loyal and remain as such to us, she had to go away. Leave us out of a sense of love to prevent this vision from happening, even if it might break our hearts at the same time. She didn’t want to hurt us, but she did. Celestia was gone and everything in me screamed in agony.

My beloved left. Only Luna was still with me. My sweet Moon, my only remaining anchor to sanity. And... and the prophecy was about to come true, wasn’t it? One of us was going to be exiled to the moon... and it would be Celestia. I... No... Please...

Not... not her, anypony but her...

Celestia... Catherine, my love. I don’t want you to be taken away from me. It would break me...

I didn’t know when but at one point Luna took me to the bed and put the covers over my body, kissing my forehead gently before leaving me alone for a moment. The world felt muted, colorless even. Less bright. Hopeless. Gloomy.

Dead.

Everything was going to be meaningless without my twin here with us. With... us... Luna was still here, right? Whatever fate saw fit to take Celestia away from me, I won’t let it take Luna, too. She was mine. Mine. I wouldn’t lose my Moon, too. Never.

She belonged to me.

Absentmindedly, I noticed I was grinding my teeth. Sharpened teeth. Hatred ran rampant within my body and I didn’t want to let go of it. I wanted to grasp it tightly, stoke the fires. Rage and destroy absolutely everything in my vicinity. But that wouldn’t help me. Or Luna. Or... or Celestia.

An explosive sigh escaped my lips, a tired yawn following it shortly after. Luna came back, distinctly smelling of strong alcohol but not excessively. I wanted some of that, I realized. Drown myself in alcohol to make the pain fade away. The more bite it had, the better.

My resolve to stay clear of the poison wavered for the first time since becoming a princess. I didn't care what it did to my mother, I only wanted it to make me feel numb and nothing more.

Luna didn't even fight me for the bottle as I took it out of her telekinetic grasp before drinking straight out of it.

I might have started coughing immediately afterward, unused to the strength Luna preferred her alcohol to be. She didn't laugh, instead enveloping me in her wings as she put the bottle away, nuzzling me softly. The care she showed me made me start to bawl again. Her soft strokes were the only comfort she gave me, but it was more than enough. 

We clung to each other, drifting off to sleep in a tight embrace. A tight embrace that told us that we were still here, that we didn’t have to fear losing each other, too. That we would remain with each other, no matter what.

The days after Tia was gone were slow. Slower than they had ever been for me. Luna and I moved through the motions of our duties like mere zombies. Day in and day out, we went through our duties, doing our bare minimum to not neglect our nation outright, and then, with much more fervor, went out searching for our sister, although we had little hope of actually finding her.

I wanted to make a public announcement, begging for Tia to come back home before whoever was going to use her could do anything. I was sure that there was some nefarious villain that must be pulling the strings from behind the scenes, about to force Celestia into betraying us, nothing else made sense. Luna stopped me from making that announcement, though. She was right to do so, it would only ensure that Tia would go further into hiding and possibly run right into the hooves of that dastardly villain.

Was I paranoid? Maybe. Was it justified? Possibly. Was I right about there being an unseen villain, somepony wanting to tear us apart? I feared so. And fear could be a powerful motivator, driving ponies to either great lengths or cause them to fall into the deepest pit from which there was no escape.

Suffice it to say, I didn't operate well on fear and paranoia.

I was living from moment to moment, driving our agents crazy by getting increasingly snappy at them for failing me so spectacularly in finding my sister. Tia was right, they were useless. If Luna had not been there for me, I would have lost myself to my fears and anxiety after the first month had passed. After the second month, I started to vent my anger on the training dummies our guard used for new recruits and Luna had to drag me away before I could openly weep in front of our little ponies (and destroy the training courtyard in the process, I guess... since when were these things so fragile, anyway?).

Hope, I bitterly thought, had abandoned me. Month after month, the only thing hope managed to do for me was to make the painful ache in my heart start to throb more and more. It was maddening. I stubbornly clung to the last vestiges of my hope for Celestia to return home safely, crying in my sleep for the universe to spare my sister her dark fate.

A year passed and no news of our sister reached us. Luna and I had searched each and every city, village, forest, and mountain (the only thing left was pretty much the ocean by this point, I swear). None of the ponies living in the places that we went to knew anything about the whereabouts of our lost sister. Not even rumors of where she could be. The population was starting to notice the lack of their third princess and unrest was already beginning to show its ugly head.

Tia always was such a public figure and now it was coming to bite us in our flanks. There was no keeping things secret, whether it be embarrassing rumors or the absence of Equestria's strongest guardian.

Another year went by in the blink of an eye and I was starting to get worried even more. My search got more and more erratic as time continued on and our ponies were noticing something was wrong. Not only with their missing princess but also with me. With each passing day, week, and month I was having more trouble thinking clearly. The worry, anxiety, and fear were making me go into hysterics. I needed to find my twin before anything happened to her.

I was one step away from breaking and it showed. Sometimes, I was missing entire days worth of memories as I moved through them in a haze, and other days, I didn't even move a single feather as I stayed in bed. The emotional toll was high, but I still had my Moon there with me, at least.

Luna was like a calming balm to my stress, anchoring my emotions as much as she could. We both desperately clung to each other, but our mutual need to find our sister had us neglecting our duties more and more. The nobles had to pick up the slack for us, and for once, they wholeheartedly helped us without ulterior motives. It was surprising that they could put their greed completely behind them for even a little while. I was glad they understood the need to help wherever they could, though.

Three years after Celestia’s disappearance, false leads were starting to trickle in and quickly managed to drive me completely mad in a chase for a specter. Somepony was playing with me, toying with me, tricking me into a false sense of hope, and then they crushed it mercilessly. It felt familiar, the methods used by this mysterious pony feeling like I had known them from somewhere.

And then it hit me. The mysterious dark artifacts full of evil and sinister magic... it was the same method, wasn’t it? Just like back when those things emerged for the first time, they were making us chase around all over the nation, only now they gave Luna and me a glimmer of hope to reunite with our sister. It was baffling, that this unknown pony was still around to make our lives miserable. The more I chased after ghosts, the more I wanted to seriously rip the soul out of the one responsible and devour it with glee.

For once I didn’t think it was a despicable thing to do. The more I thought about it, the more appealing it sounded to me. This pony that insisted on playing these horrid games with us deserved nothing less. First, they put our ponies needlessly in danger with corruptive artifacts, then they taunted us with the whereabouts of our lost sister.

After a year of this grueling back-and-forth hunting after even the littlest hints as to where my twin could be, I was too tired to continue paying attention to these false leads. I had hoped one of them would prove to be true, but after a year of doing this, I knew better. My best hope was that Celestia would return home on her own.

A hope I would be granted, just not in the way I ever expected.

“Sister? It’s time to lower the sun,” Luna said and I turned my head towards her as she brought me back out of my lost thoughts. I hummed, reaching out with my magic to lower my sun over the horizon. Although, as I did so while walking towards Luna to join her so we could retire to our bedroom, a jolt went through me and I cried out in pain. Luna raced towards me and caught me before I hit the ground, giving me a concerned gaze.

A loud bang rang through our throne room and the doors were blown open, cleanly ripped from their hinges as they thundered to the floor. Our heads whipped around to see Celestia and another pony at her side. No, not at her side, she was standing slightly behind this cloaked pony.

I squinted, making out ethereal chains around her neck and my heart sank at the clear reluctance showing in her eyes, her muzzle set in stone in a stoic mockery of her usually serene expression. A cruel, sinister laugh rang out from beneath the hood of the masked pony.

“What is the meaning of this?” Luna growled, helping me back on my hooves. I rubbed my horn, trying to alleviate the magical backlash I just went through. Whatever caused it, that pony must have been behind this.

“Kill the white one while she is still dazed,” a raspy voice rang out from the cloaked pony and I recognized the voice instantly. It had a certain whiny quality to it that I knew could only belong to one pony only.

My train of thought was derailed as Celestia actually followed the command dutifully without hesitating, throwing one of her self-developed combat spells at me with the full intent of killing me as was ordered of her. I had little time to get my muscles ready to dodge and I gasped in pain as I was blown away from Luna as the spell exploded on me, sending me crashing against the wall. I fell down, blinking rapidly as my world spun rapidly around.

So much for practicing magic to get better than Celestia at it... I never stood a chance. In a fair fight, I might have been able to protect myself against that attack, but this wasn't really a fair fight, was it? No, this was an ambush, a genuine attempt at seizing the throne from us.

“Tia! Stop this! What are you doing?!” Luna roared, teleporting to my side and putting up a shield. My sister put her trembling hooves on my side in disbelief and I winced, a whimper leaving my throat. “Don’t w-worry, Sunny. I’ll... I’ll keep you safe. You're g-going to be fine..!”

I stared at her as her hooves came back bloodied, coated in my golden-glowing, mana-rich blood. Luna was deathly pale and I could tell she was afraid I would bleed out on her. Tia did use her siege breaker on me, I probably had a gaping hole in me right now. It certainly felt like it. I was feeling... kinda... lightheaded...

I struggled slightly to focus my attention back on Luna as she turned around to face our sister, and without a doubt, the former princess that should have been dead a long time ago. Platinum had returned and somehow managed to put a leash of some kind on my twin. A leash that allowed her to command her like an obedient tin soldier.

A tin soldier with the power of the Yellow Sun on her side. Suffice it to say, we were utterly screwed.

“Release my sister at once and surrender,” Luna said, her commanding tone not allowing for any sort of argument. Platinum, on the other hoof, laughed mockingly and drew her hood back with a withered hoof. Her visage was... almost skeletal in quality. Her sunken eyes glared balefully at us, her hatred for us was just as strong as it has been since we entered her life and took everything away from her. “Or die.”

Platinum sneered. “I think not, peasant,” she hissed back at Luna, patting Celestia’s cheek almost affectionately. Almost. It was clear that she did so in a demeaning way. After all, she was still the same, greedy mare we have come to know. Platinum had changed a lot, but on a deeper level, not at all. Like back in our youth, she was still that overly self-centered, narcissistic mare that didn’t know what no meant. “It took me a great amount of time to bind her like this. Do you like it? I think it is one of my best works yet.”

My sister growled angrily at her mocking words. “Stop this and I might yet spare you your miserable life, Platinum,” Luna told her as she extended her wings threateningly. “You have gone too far with this. What kind of evil magic have you been using to prolong your life like this? To what lengths have you gone in your quest for vengeance?”

Platinum let out a mocking laugh as her sunken eyes took on a crazed look. “Ah. The soul is such a fickle thing, isn’t it?” she answered, smiling thinly and I could make out her teeth from where we were. They were sharp and jagged, twisted beyond what a pony should have had. The sharp fangs we ourselves had while in our alternate forms were at least still normal. The feral quality of what Platinum’s teeth looked like, on the other hoof? It was... nightmarish.

This... this was the unexpected betrayal, the nightmare that would arise and threaten the world if left to her own devices. The prophecy never talked about us betraying each other, I just interpreted it that way because of everything else mentioned in the prophecy. I was a fool. I never realized it until it was too late.

And now, we were only moments away from fulfilling the rest of the prophecy. There must be a way to change at least one thing, please. I don't want to lose my twin to this... abomination.

How far have you truly fallen from grace, Platinum? Have you really become this nightmarish caricature of a pony all on your own? To think I ever gave you a chance to overcome your faults...

“How can you defile the sanctity of souls like that?!” I asked, more than 'just' horrified. The thought of her twisting her own soul, or even consuming them to extend her life... it made my fur crawl in horror. Using magic in such a way... it was a crime against life and death. It was a darkness that shouldn’t exist. 

A piece of darkness left behind by the Devourer of Life and Death.

How... how did she come upon a remnant of that vile being? Why would she even let it change her so? She... no, that’s it, isn’t it? Everything that would grant her the ability to enact her revenge upon us... she would gladly take it for herself, wouldn’t she? She was too far gone, that much was obvious.

She was irredeemable. Pure evil. Platinum... to think that I once granted her more than one chance to better herself. I should have seen her for the monster that she truly is, the monster that she turned into standing right before us. I was naïve and stupid to think that she could be anything but this abomination, desecrating the sanctity of the soul like that.

“Defiling is such a strong word, don’t you think?” Platinum spat. Her crazed eyes chilled me to the bones as she showed no remorse at all. “I like to think of it as a sacrifice for the greater good. They died for a greater cause. A grander cause. As will you.”

“You...” I whispered, realizing for the first time what had been right under our muzzles. “All the missing cases... the dark artifacts. Why..? How could you?!”

“How could I? How could I?! I will tell you why,” she said, sneering. “I needed to perfect my masterpiece, the most complex spell your small, simple, insignificant minds could only hope to understand. All so that I could take back my rightful place. You don’t belong on those thrones! I will put everything back to how it should be, you little heretics. My plan of tempting that buffoon Tirek into taking away your powers failed... but this one shall not! Ah ha ha ha!”

Luna shot a beam of magic at her, tired of Platinum’s whining that we didn’t ‘deserve’ our place. Celestia, though, intercepted the attack dutifully as she was reduced to a mere pet and it broke my heart to see her fight for this disgusting miscreant. Platinum laughed in her megalomaniacal way, powering her horn up in a twisted light of cold and icy blue, vivid dark purple, sickly green, and bubbling black.

Her magic aura was even more horrid than black magic alone, I realized. I recognized the green sting of fel-touched magic signifying her corrupted mental state. It was a devious type of magic I thought only existed in Azeroth, but apparently, ponies were also very much capable of harnessing the demon's signature, hellish magic.

Even from all the way over here, the icy blue aura felt like all life was being sucked out of me. There was only one possibility of what kind of magic that could be: death magic. Amore once told me it was the primary source of the dreaded umbrum, beings of pure death and shadow. It was the complete opposite of the pure, soothing light blue magic of love.

The black aura was an obvious sign of dark magic, but... what was that purple aura? It felt similar to what the sha had felt like on Pandaria, but also not. In a way, it felt more malicious and deranged...

I was thrown out of my thought as Luna intercepted another of Celestia's spells meant for me before she turned her head toward me. “Go! Get to safety, Summer!” Luna told me, shooting a beam of arcane might at Platinum in an effort to stop her from completing whatever spell she was casting. None of them connected, sadly. Our sister was protecting her, despite the clear reluctance I could see in her eyes. She was fighting, trying to break free of the control Platinum had over her. 

Her efforts wouldn’t be enough to regain her freedom, I could tell. A single look at those chains around her neck was enough to tell me that they were far too strong for her to break out of. They were resisting even the might of alicorn magic. This pale light blue soul magic... it was unlike anything we had encountered before. And without sufficiently enough knowledge about it, we would be hopelessly tapping around in the dark trying to find a way to counter it.

“No. I won’t leave you behind, Luna,” I said, wincing as I struggled to stand beside her. Breathing was difficult, but I gritted my teeth in determination. Luna gave me a pleading look, one I returned with as much ferocity as I could muster. She wouldn’t leave me alone, I won’t risk her being taken away from me, too. I won't let anypony take my Moon away from me, never.

Together we could defeat Platinum. Hopefully.

Alas, we were thoroughly outmatched by the magical abilities of our sister. She expertly deflected everything Luna threw at her and my own pitiful attempts were even less effective than Luna’s. My magic still felt sluggish after the backlash and Platinum continued her spell unhindered. A sense of urgency filled me and I desperately called out to my magic to do something, anything.

Try as we might, Luna and I were too late as the spell Platinum cast finished with a bright and sickly light. A wailing sound akin to what I would have associated with a banshee echoed around us and we watched in total and utter soul-rending horror as Platinum dissolved into a miasma of a cloud before she completely surrounded my twin.

The icy blue cloud flickered with green and black particles, a purple haze ensnaring my twin with sickly and putrid tentacles reminiscent of what we had seen in the smoky illusion of the Devourer of Life and Death on Azeroth, slowly entering Celestia and I cried out in denial at what she was doing. She was possessing her. Platinum, the Bitchqueen Supreme, was possessing my wife.

By my sun... she was possessing my wife! No! Not like this!

Something within me snapped and my magic answered the call in a raging tempest of arcane wrath as it shot forth, blasting a path of absolute annihilation toward Platinum’s cloud-like state, ripping the throne room apart from top to bottom. My sister... no, Platinum stepped out of the smoke and grinned cruelly as she flicked her head and deflected my attack with no effort at all.

She laughed crazily, turning her head around in order to look herself over with glee. She had a dark purple coat and her eyes were slit. The iris was a deep blue and her mane pale white mane had a sickly, light cyan streak running through it. But most notably, her horn resembled Sombra’s curved, red horn. Even her Cutie Mark had changed. Gone was the crown she had been so proud of before. In its stead were a horn and fiery, blue wings to represent her greed of stealing her alicornhood from my sister. “I’m young! I’m young! Ah ha ha hah! And all of this power! Nothing can stand against me now! I shall rule forever! Ah ha ha ha!”

Luna was in front of her a moment later, moving incredibly fast and throwing herself at our foe. I could see the coat of my sister turning black as they started fighting up close, trying to bite each other’s throats out. Both of them were rolling around on the ground for a moment before my sister blasted her directly through the roof after she bucked her up into the air to get a clear shot at her.

“Get the Elements, sister!” Nightmare shouted at me, readying her wings to take off after Platinum. “We need to purge her from Tia!”

“But... without Tia, who would wield Magic and Loyalty?” I asked. Uncertainty and fear froze me up in absolute terror. This... I-I couldn’t do this. I don’t want to do this. It would m-mean... it would mean that Tia would be trapped on the moon with that... that monster. For a thousand years. I can’t let the prophecy fulfill itself like that. I won't let it! There must be something I could do, damnit!

Nightmare snarled, glaring at me with heavy reluctance. She knew it as well, didn’t she? “Just take them and use them, Summer! We need to do something!”

Then, she was gone. Gone after where she had thrown the usurper through the roof. I glanced at the destroyed cover of the hidden mechanism in the floor where we stored the Elements of Harmony.

Could I... could I tell them to spare my sister this fate? It was my only hope. I didn’t want to do this, but if we didn’t do something in order to deal with Platinum because we didn’t want to use the Elements on her for fear of taking Celestia away, what would happen to our nation? She would ruin everything we built up, bringing about the destruction of the very ideals Equestria stood for. 

We had to use them even if it meant Celestia was caught in the crossfire. Tia would have done the same, right? Our duty to safeguard our nation, this world... it has to come before our own desires.

And I hated it. I hated that this was what we needed to do. I didn’t want to do it, I really didn’t want to, but... what else could I do? This destiny, this damn prophecy... why, Clover? Why did you have to go and make this damn prophecy? Why couldn’t you ignore your temptation and stay away from prophetic magic? It was the ultimate jinx, a curse of knowledge. 

A prophecy would come true, I painfully learned. A vision, one could work with that, it was malleable, but a prophecy foreseen by magic? It had the ugly tendency to come true regardless of what you tried. I was a fool for believing otherwise. A fool to hope that we could prevent it. That we could ignore it.

The Elements lifted themselves off the pedestal they were on, rising within my telekinesis. Each one shined with power magnitudes greater than I could ever achieve on my own and I could feel their desire to be wielded for good. 

To do what needs to be done.

Nightmare crashed through the roof and I heard the cackling, twisted tone of Platinum within the body of my twin sister. All that stood before me was a twisted alicorn because we were too weak to prevent this outcome. This was the moment Tia had seen in her vision, wasn’t it? Fighting us with the intent to kill, trapped in her own body being marionetted around by a vile monster.

The Elements responded to me and me alone. Nightmare Moon was dazed on the ground, coughing up blue-glowing blood, and I turned my gaze back to the true nightmare in the room. With a pleading thought, I told the Elements to get Platinum away from my sister. Get her as far away as possible, to spare my sister her life.

I should have worded my thoughts more clearly. I should have given the Elements a clearer command than ‘take Platinum away from my sister’. Because, as they powered up and fired a rainbow of pure power at her, they took my words literally.

They send Platinum away from my sister. Away... from Nightmare Moon, not from Celestia. They misinterpreted my words and I wailed in agonized screams for them to bring Celestia back, to give me back my wife. 

The Elements fell down in useless hunks of rock. My connection was ultimately broken to them as I directed them at my own sister and because I had used them without having a connection to Loyalty, Laughter, Honesty, and Magic.

Grey orbs replaced their crystalline bodies and I couldn’t feel their presence anymore. I... I stared in disbelief at their petrified remains, groveling down on the ground in front of them, begging them to make things right. To bring me back my beloved. A black hoof gently dragged me away from them as I began to scream at them to obey me. I raged and flailed in denial, throwing insults at them for betraying me like that.

Another unexpected betrayal, even though I knew the outcome from the beginning. I had desperately hoped they would understand my desires better, but they had done no such thing. They ignored my distraught pleas, punishing me for something that I had no idea what I could have done wrong.

Nightmare held me tightly in her hooves, her own sorrowful cries echoing around in the destroyed throne room. Everything had come crashing down on us, it was a mistake to ignore the prophecy like that. I had been such a fool. I lost what is mine. 

I lost against fate and against the universe.

I wouldn’t let it take my remaining wife from me, too. She is mine. Hope failed me, abandoning me in my time of need. Kindness held me back. Generosity took everything from me. Never again. I would hold onto my beloved Moon with a fierce grasp.

Sorrow drowned me and I buried my muzzle in the fur of my sister, not wanting to let go. I needed her now more than ever. Without her, I would have been lost. Lost in my depression. 

I couldn’t bring myself to move, it was just too much. My sister had an easier time getting a grip on herself, her tears lessening the longer we stayed in our tight embrace.

Nightmare nudged me ever so slightly, nuzzling me softly with a sad sigh. “We... we have to get away from here, Sunny. This place... it feels dirty now.”

“But...” I muttered, sniffling a few times. I leaned away from her in order to look into her eyes. “Everything is here... C-Celestia’s things a-and...”

“Shh...” she hummed as I started to breathe in too fast again due to an oncoming panic attack. “We will pack everything up and move it to Canterlot. I can’t stand staying here where I will constantly be reminded of what we lost today. We can prepare for her return there...”

“So we just... abandon what we’ve built here?” I asked, giving her an incredulous look. She only shrugged listlessly as she bit her lower lip and I whimpered in reluctance. She was right, I guess. This place would only manage to drive me further into despair. I... I didn’t want to leave everything behind, but the memories here would remind me painfully of what we had and what we wouldn’t have... for a thousand years. “I miss her...”

“I do, too,” she said, rubbing my back comfortingly. A gesture I leaned into, reciprocating it myself slowly. She needed it as much as I did. This wasn't how I imagined our reunion would go with Celestia... I really need a drink, preferably a whole bottle or two.

Haah. Look at me, Mom! I am following in your hoofsteps! Aren't you proud of your useless daughter? Ugh, I hate my life.

Nightmare unintentionally brought me out of my depressive thoughts as she turned her head slightly upwards. “Did you lower the suns?” she asked me and I blinked, reaching out to my sun. Much to my surprise, though, I found out that it had been lowered already.

What was going on? I shook my head and gave my Moon a frown. “No, did you?”

“I... didn’t. So, why is the moon up? I haven’t done that...” Nightmare muttered, looking up at the hole in the ceiling with a frown. I followed her gaze and saw the moon, but it looked... different. “That... is that a face?”

I mutely nodded, staring at the dark marks on the moon that resembled the head of a unicorn, or rather, an alicorn. “Platinum... staring down on us.”

“That’s what she always wanted to do, isn’t it?” my sister snarled, growling slightly. “She is marring my beautiful moon with her filthy visage! My! Moon! I’ll rip her soul out and tear it to shreds!”

I winced as she used the Royal Canterlot Voice and did the only thing I knew would work to calm her down and silence her. Pressing my lips against hers, she practically melted against me. “Let’s go to sleep and t-then... then we can prepare to leave for Canterlot.”

My sister nodded, returning to her regular form as she calmed herself properly down. She gave my side a look, where I had been injured by Celestia... no, not by my sister, by Platinum... and followed her gaze. My injury was already almost gone, my alicorn magic knitting the flesh together faster than what a mortal could ever hope to achieve. I gave my sister a wobbly smile, assuring her that I felt fine now. An alicorn could withstand a lot, more than what we had previously assumed. I doubted even a sword to the heart would actually kill us. Short of tearing each and every cell apart, I don't think anything could.

The first night after the prophecy had been fulfilled was spent in sleepless silence between Luna and me. We couldn’t drift off to sleep (and stay asleep) no matter how much we tried, and honestly, I didn’t want to. We were mourning the loss of Celestia, and had we gone to sleep, we would have been assaulted by the last moments before we lost her for far longer than either of us was comfortable with. A thousand years...

Written down, it doesn’t seem much, does it? Such an innocent number... It was anything but. A thousand years without my beloved, without our wife, it was an eternity. An eternity we would have to endure with only each other as company. It could have been worse, I suppose. If one of us had been left alone for a thousand years, I don’t know if we might have been able to do this.

In the end, it was a less cruel fate than what Celestia has to endure on her own. She was trapped with that monster on the moon without a way to break free of Platinum’s clutches. My twin sister was nothing more than a marionette and I wept for her. I wept and wept as I cried without stopping. She didn’t deserve this. None of us deserved such a cruel fate.

The next morning, I was faced with another challenge, one I didn't expect.

“Who will raise her sun..?” I whispered while staring numbly out towards the balcony. Luna let out an inquisitive hum, just as listless as I felt, and I turned my head so I was gazing into her eyes instead. “Celestia’s sun. Somepony will need to raise and lower it. For a thousand years...”

“We can always try and share the burden...” Luna said as she slowly got up and I followed her. “It won’t be easy for me, though. You and Tia were better at raising each other’s suns.”

I sighed before reaching out to my sun while Luna reached out to her moon. “I suppose I will have to bear through it, then. It will still be hard, though. Even with your help, her sun is much more different than mine.”

"Hey..." my sister hummed, nuzzling me softly. “We will get through this,” she reassured me and I leaned my head against hers. “We could try to do it together. That way, neither of us will have to shoulder the whole burden all at once.”

I let out a thoughtful hum before nodding at that idea. If we do it like that, it would lessen the burden immensely. Neither of us was bonded to Celestia's sun, so this would still be a monumental task. If we were to do it alone, though, it would slowly weaken us even with our own celestial bodies aiding us in our endeavors.

Both of us took hold of the Heavenly Sun, prodding it gently along as we guided our own celestial bodies over the horizon. Celestia’s sun resisted for a moment, unsure of why her caretaker wasn’t there to guide her over the sky, so I whispered a few sorrowful ‘words’ back, explaining what had happened.

Luna and I were almost overtaken as her sun responded with a white-hot, burning fury. It took us a lot of effort to calm the distraught sun down. It was understandable, she wanted her caretaker back just as much as we did. We shared in her pain, but... sooner rather than later, Celestia’s sun would have to get used to Luna and me, though. I wanted to bring back my twin as much as her sun wanted her back, but that would also mean Platinum would return with her.

We couldn’t risk that. Not before we were absolutely certain we could purge her from Celestia without hurting my twin at the same time. With the Elements of Harmony pretty much gone (perhaps even dead, for all we know), we had no means to purify Celestia of Platinum's presence. New wielders have to be found. Wielders that could revive the Elements (if that was even possible...), and use them in the right way. Use them to free my sister.

Luna and I would have to wait a long time for that... an eternity by all rights. The prophecy said that the nightmare will end after a thousand years. And only should the Elements be used in true harmony will my sister be returned to me. To us. I have to believe the Elements would return, I just have to...

I gave our bed a sad glance. We had been sharing it for such a long time now and it wouldn’t be the same without Celestia there. Luna nuzzled me, sensing my distress and she whispered a few soothing words. It was time to pack up the things we wanted to take with us and leave behind a painful chapter in our lives.

This castle has an oppressive feeling now. Luna was absolutely right about that. I didn’t feel at home here anymore, the pain of losing my wife in these halls was terribly vicious. Perhaps it was time for a change in scenery, to be closer to our ponies where they didn’t have to traverse through the dark, gloomy Everfree Forest in order to reach us.

Besides, Canterlot already has a place where we could stay at. The big mansion would make for a grand castle after we expand upon it. It wouldn’t even need much work, it was pretty much a palace already. The nobles have wanted us to make it our seat of power since we first started out as princesses and I suppose it would have to do for now.

My Moon primarily took a few paintings with her that wouldn’t remind her too much of what we had lost and I raided our memory balls for everything that they were worth. The little moments were the most important ones and I couldn’t bear the thought of them gathering dust in our half-destroyed castle.

And, as it turns out, the fight between us and Platinum had done a lot more damage to our home than I initially thought. Well... our former home now, I guess.

Obviously, the throne room was nigh unrecognizable anymore. The only thing remaining were the thrones and the half-burnt tapestries depicting our celestial bodies above them. Most of the windows lay shattered on the torn-up ground while half of the ceiling had collapsed during the night. Most of the damage came from my destructive spell and the other half from Celestia and Luna exchanging high-powered arcane spells. It happened more or less due to them reflecting each other's spells than purposefully wreaking havoc on our castle. Not that I think Platinum minded it that much, having happily thrown my sister through the roof.

It was so very hard to leave it all behind. The rest of the castle didn't look much better, one of the towers had even collapsed entirely during their fight. Rebuilding it would probably take more work than it would take us to expand the mansion in Canterlot. And even then, staying here was far too dangerous with the structurally unsound areas posing a threat to our servants and guards.

Then, there was also Celestia's sword, shimmering in the light of my levitation aura as I gazed mournfully down upon it. Her weapon would also come with us, I decided. After all, my sister wouldn’t want to let it gather dust.

My twin never gave it a name, always viewing it as a mere tool. It was kind of sad, really. Now? Now she had become the tool, instead. A tool to a megalomaniacal usurper that we should have killed a long time ago.

I regretted stopping my sisters from doing just that as we first met that cockroach in pony's clothing. I never thought that I would regret something like that, but here I was. For the first time, I wanted nothing more than to see a pony dead.

Ponies were no better than humans, I thought darkly. Able to reach even greater depths than humans had ever achieved. Disgusting, worthless pieces of..!

I shook that wrathful thought from my mind and frowned at the reflection within Tia’s blade. I could have prevented all of this, had I been less merciful. The sword of my twin would be that reminder for a very long time to come. The reminder that I was the one at fault for her being possessed by Platinum. For allowing Platinum to live. For allowing her to become the greatest stain upon the history of ponykind.

Perhaps I should name the blade for Tia? 'Regret' would be a fitting name, but that decision wasn’t mine to make. I suppose I would have to content myself with keeping it safe and taking care of it to the best of my abilities.

And for that matter, I would also take care of her pet for her. Philomena let out a confused trill, questioning me where Celestia was. Yu’la had been sleeping next to her and was understandably curious as well as to what was going on. A sad smile found its way on my muzzle and I explained with a sorrowful sigh that we were leaving and that Celestia won’t be coming back anytime soon. I would be taking care of her from now on (which I have been doing a lot, even before my twin ran out on us).

Philomena was understandably upset about 'Mama' Tia being gone, but Yu'la was quick to remind her that 'Aunty' Summer was the Cookie Mistress Supreme, so everything would be fine. I wasn't sure whether to feel offended or honored. My darling dragon, reducing me to 'Snack-Mom'...

Ah, well... I could live with that, I suppose. She wasn't wrong, per se.

Once we had packed everything we wanted to take with us, we left our old castle behind. Our servants and guards assisted us with the luggage and we made our journey towards Canterlot on hoof. These were uncertain times for everypony, one of their princesses was now lost to them and things would never be the same again.

Not even their grandfoals would get to see the return of my sister, I mused as I watched each and every servant follow us dutifully to our new home. And with our strongest guardian gone, the neighboring nations would surely see an opportunity to take advantage of us. I feared we might even face our first (actual) war without Celestia there to be the steadfast ruler that could intimidate them enough to not attack us.

That responsibility would now rest sorely on Luna’s and my own shoulders. We needed to be stronger than ever for our ponies and keep this nation safe. Even if it meant we had to lead them through conflicts that might take more lives than I was comfortable with. I knew one nation that would gladly try their luck with conquering Equestria and I wouldn’t allow them to lay their dirty claws on our land (and sky, as the case might be).

What is it with griffons and having one dictator after another on their throne, anyway? Come on, you guys! If the guy on the throne is a dick, throw him in the dungeons! Or... do whatever griffons do, I don't know! I don't wanna deal with it again...

Ugh. I just know they would find some stupid technicality in the peace treaty, again. There was no way the stupid bird brain on the throne wouldn’t try to take advantage of our situation, probably arguing that with Celestia gone, the old treaty was null and void once more. We... fuck, we need to prepare for that possibility, don’t we?

Above all else, we need to adapt. If I had to, I would become the War Princess this kingdom needs to keep it safe. I wouldn’t let my ideals come in the way of keeping what is mine safe. They had already failed me, so why should I bother to adhere to them any longer? Morals are for weak, naïve little mares who give traitorous monsters way too many chances. They are nothing more than a hindrance.

Well, I say no more! My damn bleeding heart won’t get in the way of what is necessary anymore. Perhaps it was high time to let go of it. To stop caring. Why should I give them any leeway with what they could get away with? I won't give anypony the chance to take advantage of my kindness anymore, they are all unworthy! I won't let another Platinum happen when I could just...

No. I shook my head, trying to dislodge that train of thought. I can’t fall into this abyssal darkness so easily. I couldn’t allow these dark whispers to swallow me whole like that. Celestia wouldn’t want that. She wouldn’t want to return to this bitter mare that failed her, having forsaken all her ideals because she couldn’t keep what is hers. If I forsake my heart completely, would she even recognize me once she returns? Or would Luna have to banish me to the moon next?

I swore to myself, I wouldn’t let that ever happen. I wouldn’t let myself be changed so drastically. Our nation needed a strong ruler, that much was true, but not at the price of creating another monster for the sake of battling our enemies. Whether from within or from outside our nation.

Maybe I was starting to become paranoid in my old age. Paranoid that everypony was out to get us. I was jumping at shadows, seeing enemies in every pony I interacted with. And it was all Platinum's fault. My trust in ponykind has been shattered only because of one bad apple.

It's going to take a lot of work for me to regain my faith in the good of ponykind, I fear. Not everypony was going to turn out to be the 'next Platinum', I know, but... it was hard to ignore these thoughts, this damn paranoia. These dark whispers of my psyche kept pushing themselves into the foreground of my thoughts. It was a downright battle to not fall for them.

We would endure, of that much I was certain. But at what cost? I dearly hoped I wouldn’t start to entertain this vicious thought again. I was stronger than that, I knew it in my heart, but... something told me I wouldn’t be that fortunate. That I would have no choice but to take up the mantle of the War Princess. That I would have to rule with an iron hoof.

Then, there was the reaction of our ponies to the news of Celestia being gone and the one that was responsible for it. The day of Platinum’s defeat became a new holiday. A fucking holiday.

It didn’t need to exist, in my opinion. It was insensitive of our ponies, but I understood why they felt like celebrating this 'memorable' day. It gave them the reassurance that we would keep this nation safe, no matter what. On the other hoof, though, this holiday only brought heartache to Luna and me.

I was very much tempted to stomp this holiday out of existence as soon as it popped up, but our ponies insisted on celebrating the longest day of the year. And let's be honest here, I didn’t have it in my heart to deny them from celebrating one of the few holidays we had. Besides Hearth’s Warming, we now had the Summer Sun and Moon Festival, honoring my sister and me for keeping the world safe from a nightmare that would have swallowed it whole.

I could live with that (reluctant as I was), but that didn't mean I would have to be happy about it. Lulu and I didn't even get a free day of work out of it unlike our ponies since we just have to put on a performance for them of raising and lowering the suns and the moon.

Where's my holiday of sleeping in, huh? Ugh, what I won't do for my ponies...

Canterlot grew a lot with our relocation to the capital. Ponies came to celebrate us and our new castle stood tall like a shining jewel by the end of the first year of Celestia being gone. A new era had started for Equestria, the Era of the Two Royal Sisters.

While everything was not good with Tia 'exiled', things could get a lot worse. And they did. They got a whole lot more worse. Absolutely, maddeningly worse. Ponies started to get nightmares and panic spread about Luna and I supposedly being tyrannical megalomaniacs torturing ponies in our basement for 'fun'.

Two guesses as to who was behind all of this and the first one doesn't count.

Luna tried to fight against these nightmares as best as she could, but there was a far more sinister driving force behind them. Platinum had somehow found a way to tyrannize our ponies from the dream realm, earning herself the nickname of ‘The Evil Alicorn Queen, Nightmare Dream’ (a ridiculous name, in my opinion... and Luna absolutely hated it, obviously). A certain eldritch Bitchface used the nightmares to spread unrest while Luna and I had next to no idea what to do against it.

Well, there was one thing we could do... but it would come with a hefty price, indeed. A price I was willing to pay, though.

“Are you sure about this, sister?” Luna asked and I turned my gaze away from the crackling flames within our fireplace. 

I sighed heavily, having made up my mind about it as soon as we learned who was behind this incursion into the dream realm. “Yes, Lulu. We can protect our ponies with our magic from her cruel influence. If we have to sacrifice our own protection, then so be it.”

My sister laughed hollowly at that. “You sound a lot like her, you know?” Luna pointed out and I grimaced. “It suits you, though. I’m glad you are still here with me, Summer.”

“I wouldn’t ever leave you, sister,” I smiled, nuzzling her cheek affectionately. “Let us cast the spell and save Equestria from her meddling hooves. If we dream together from now on, maybe it will help us resist her influence as much as possible.”

“The dream realm is my domain,” Luna sighed, starting to pace back and forth in front of me. “It irks me that she is twisting it so. It is supposed to be a safe retreat for our ponies...”

“It will be so again, Luna,” I told her, stopping her in her tracks and giving her a kiss. “For them, we would do anything, wouldn’t we?”

“I can’t believe I’m going to say this, but...” Luna began and smiled more genuinely at me. “I’m glad you made us follow Starswirl back so that we could become princesses. It seems we were made for this position.”

I hummed, enjoying the moment she deepened our kiss to include our tongues. I threw my forehooves around her and let us fall back on the big cushion in front of our fireplace. Our horns began to glow with our magic, and together, we began to weave the spellcraft to safeguard the minds of our subjects from Platinum in exchange for our own safety in the dream realm.

The spell wasn't actually a spell in the conventional sense. Nor was it a ritual, per se. We simply changed an aspect of our alicorn nature, more or less. Well, I say 'changed' like it was some sort of configuration on a computer system, but it was the best analogy I could find for it. Nor was it actually a change in itself. If I had to put it into the most accurate way I could describe it, we 'expanded' the natural safeguard of our subconsciousness to that of our subjects while they slumber. Hence it would leave us weak to attacks in the dream realm, instead.

It was still easier to think of it as a spell, though. Less hassle explaining to our subjects why everypony would suddenly sleep easier at night.

The effect took place as soon as we released the 'spell', but that didn’t stop us from eating each other’s faces out. I wasn’t going to look forward to going to sleep now, and as long as we didn’t feel tiredness claim us, we would stave it off with lots of sex.

I needed it to take my mind off of all the things that had happened recently, and judging by the eagerness Luna showed, she also needed this as much as I did. I’m glad we had the foresight to put a soundproofing spell on our new private chambers. It wouldn't do for a maid to walk in on us while we made hot, passionate sister sex, after all.

Haah, since when have I started to think of it that way? I really was a naughty pony at heart. Or ponies were a bad influence on me, who knows. I swear, most ponies have no shame at all, talking about sex as casually as they would the weather.

Equestria as a whole had become a 'sexual paradise' mostly because earthponies and pegasi didn't give a flying penguin about the unicorns' prudishness. Heck, I still remember the days when Mom and Dad went at it like rabbits before Mom got pregnant with Luna. They weren't exactly a 'quiet' couple.

Things have only gotten worse, in that regard. Half of that I chalked up to a mare's estrus cycle (the spring and summer months were especially not safe for young, impressionable minds), the other half... well, that was mostly Tia's fault, I swear. The herd reform was the primary reason why talking about sex in public became such a blasé thing. Or having sex in 'private' public spaces (and by that, I mean behind a bush in the park, for example).

I can't really say I was ashamed of this change, a part of me found it even kind of cute. It's almost like ponies were reduced to naughty teenagers again, living life to the fullest. And the boom in foals was a nice bonus for population growth, so there was that.

In a sense, sex has become a comfort for our ponies, oftentimes shared between not only partners but friends as well. After the recent hardships, who could blame them? I certainly don't, I also used 'hot, lesbian sister sex' as a way to comfort myself and feel good.

Haah. I can still feel that last remnant of human prudishness in me rebel against me every time I think of it that way. Well, fuck that! I'm not gonna let it affect me. I'm an adult! Feeling ashamed of my desires is for petty mortals and their shortcomings in accepting others as they are!

Now, if only I could get over my own fears of what incest could lead to if it were made legal. Hmm... nah. Doing something naughty in secret had a certain thrill to it that I wasn't ready to give up just yet.

Speaking of doing naughty things in secret... Luna giggled as I threw my shoes off to the side and took hers within my magic while she freed me of my chest piece. I smiled a bit brighter as she began to give my horn attention and I got rid of the rest of her regalia as well, reaching out with my wings to softly stroke hers.

My sister started grinding herself against me and I let out a tiny gasp from the combined sensation of her licking my horn and my clit rubbing against her hindleg. My marehood was soaking wet already and I wanted nothing more than to have her ravish me at that moment. 

“Mhh, L-Lulu,” I moaned, bucking slightly with my rear and getting her to squeak out beautifully, too. She moved a little in circles with her rear and I reached out a wandering hoof towards her gorgeous Cutie Mark, squeezing it and making her gasp with delight.

Luna smiled deviously down at me and picked up her pace, bucking against me herself and I let out a pleased mewl as she bit down on one of my ears. “Sing f-for me, sister!”

I moaned louder as she said that and got a bit rougher in her movements with me. “Luna-a~! Ahn!”

She grinned as I screamed her name and began to pull on my ear with her teeth. The little bit of pain had me howling in delight and it only aroused my sister more. Soon enough, her riding crop joined the fun and my voice began to go hoarse as I voiced out my pleasure. 

If only Celestia could have been here. Luna drove my melancholic thoughts away from my mind, though, by slapping the riding crop harshly against my Cutie Mark while bucking against me with more impulsive movements.

My world exploded in bliss and joy, riding my first orgasm for all that it was worth. Luna, I noticed absentmindedly, continued with her ministrations. I felt her fangs near my neck and let out a begging whine, wanting her to drink from me in the literal sense. And, as she stopped teasing me with featherlight touches of her fangs, I moaned blissfully as she granted me a pleasure I hadn’t felt for a while. The pain didn’t even register as that to my brain as all I could feel was joy.

I don’t care if this was a demented fetish, it set me off each and every time I was treated as a mere food source. That was all I was and deserved to be. A food source for my pretty Moon.

Another orgasm followed the last and I was renewing my screams with a fervor. She squeezed another orgasm out of me by the time she let herself fall prey to her own body, shuddering against me with loud moans.

“How was that?” Luna giggled, capturing my lips for a moment before letting go so we could breathe after our little bit of exertion. I giggled back happily, stroking my hoof through her soft fur with admiration. The taste of my own blood on her tongue was simply...

“Extraordinary, sister,” I told her breathily, reversing our position so I was on top of her. If we weren’t part thestral, it would have probably been extremely disgusting. And she would have thrown up afterward, I’m sure. We could consume blood like anything else only because of that fact alone. Not that we made it a habit to feed each other our own blood. “I’m just sad that Tia can’t be here with us. It won’t stop me from doing this, though...”

Luna was about to ask me what I meant, but as she opened her mouth I had already put a gag on her. I grinned mischievously down at her, conjuring a few magical bindings and securing her tightly so she couldn’t move. I heard her moan as I put a blindfold on her and moved away from her. This was going to drive her nuts, I just knew it.

I took one of my feathers that came loose without resistance, mentally telling myself that I needed to preen again sometime soon, and got to work. Celestia wasn’t the only one that could tease the Tartarus out of somepony.

Better not dwell on such thoughts, I told myself with a shake of my head. Only madness awaited me down that road. There was nothing I could do but wait now and try to find a solution for when Platinum returns with her, welcoming Tia back with a loving embrace. If there was another way to bring her back, I would have gladly taken it. Alas, nothing came to mind that would give me back my sister except the passage of time. We couldn’t just fly up to the moon, sadly.

Maybe... no, that would be silly. And technology of that kind was well out of our reach, too. Not unless we fancy dealing with a free Discord, anyway. As much as I wanted to try everything, there was simply no way for us to reach the moon. Heck, teleportation would have been my first thought, but even alicorns couldn’t do everything. My necklace might have worked, but without the connection to Celestia, it wouldn’t do anything.

I focused my attention back on my tied-up sister, shaking away my rampant thoughts. Wishful thinking would get me nowhere. Besides, even if we somehow made our way to the moon, how would we deal with Platinum? Sucking up her soul would endanger Celestia to the same fate, too.

Once more I cursed the Elements for abandoning us. I had tried to find them in the Realm of Ascension, but they weren’t there. Even there they eluded us. I didn’t want to entertain what that meant because, quite frankly, it frightened me to no end. Did I... do I still stand true to my ideals? I... I didn’t actually mean what I thought back then, it was a spur-of-the-moment thing. I was still kind and generous... I still had hope, right? They couldn’t just think I abandoned my ideals. If anything, they abandoned us.

What if... what if they were actually dead for real?

I distracted myself from my thoughts, telling myself again that I shouldn’t linger so much on such grim musings, by using the feather in my telekinesis to get my sister to moan for me. Smiling, I teased her everywhere my fancy took me, making her squirm beautifully underneath my touches.

Using my tongue, I licked the needy entrance of my sister slowly. She was trying to shove her snatch towards me, but I wasn’t having any of that. Lulu whined and I started to giggle again. The feather went over to her horn at my command, lightly tracing the spiral, and to my surprise, her horn began to sputter with magic as she let out a heavy moan. 

“Huh,” I whispered to myself, staring at the feather with contemplation. Might have to try that out myself, at some point. 

My sister writhed and moaned as I decided to have mercy on her and plunged my tongue into her eager pussy while continuing to do what I had been doing with the feather. Wriggling my tongue around, I was greeted with muffled screams and I took extra delight in them.

She was screaming for me just as much as I had for her and I wouldn’t disappoint her now, would I?

Like a conductor on a stage, I made my sister do all sorts of noises, from whining to begging to lewd moans. Every possible sound she could have made, I made her do them for me. At the crescendo, I had her screaming in the Royal Canterlot Voice, and her body pulsed with the vibrations her voice made as she went through an earth-shattering orgasm.

I didn’t stop, just like she hadn’t stopped for me. She was my instrument to play with as I saw fit and I wouldn’t be satisfied until she was unable to make another sound.

By the time we couldn’t go on any longer, both of us were unable to make sounds besides happy, heavy, and exhausted breathing. We persisted halfway through the night, forcing our bodies through orgasm after orgasm in an effort to keep sleep away as much as possible.

Sadly, we had to succumb to slumber at some point. As we had planned, our dreams were now shared, no matter what. That didn’t save us from the wrath of the nightmare Platinum had become, though. She had enlisted the aid of creatures that were called ‘nyx’ (little dream wardens, I suppose) and what she had done to them was truly monstrous.

Luna had already warned me that whatever Platinum did to gain access to the dream realm wouldn’t be pretty. And she was right, Platinum had quite literally corrupted these once-innocent creatures into beings of darkness, hatred, and nightmares.

Of course, Platinum had no actual idea of what she was doing and tried her best to cause us nightmares, as well. Luna was having none of it and dispelled all of her attempts at causing us a bad night. Had I known Platinum was this bad at it, I wouldn’t have feared going to sleep so much.

Surely with the protection over our subjects' minds, nopony would fall for her pathetic attempts any longer.

“Your paltry tricks aren’t even worth our time, Platinum,” Luna told her in no uncertain terms, wings spread wide in confidence. Her confidence inspired me to do the same, and together, we glared at the disgrace to ponykind with contempt.

“You little mongrel...” Platinum sneered. “I might be unable to rule as I should, but my time will come, ‘Princess’. Mark my words, your precious ponies won’t be safe from me for long. I will come for you and destroy everything you have built.”

“You will leave them alone, Platinum,” I said sternly, pawing at the ground in anger. She wouldn’t touch a single one of them, not for as long as I lived. Luna and I would keep them safe, forever. “Because if you don’t...”

“Oh, the filthy farmer has gained some courage, I see,” Platinum laughed derisively. “Whatever shall I do? You little heathens are nothing to me. Nothing!”

“We are a thousand times more regal than the princess you could have ever hoped to be. Having been farmers before ascending to the throne doesn’t change that,” Luna shot back. “You are nothing but a lowly bully. That’s what you are, isn’t it? Your daddy didn’t love you enough and you lashed out. Poor little Platinum, forever alone~...”

“Be silent, you little...” Platinum growled, lighting up her horn with stolen alicorn magic as she spread her equally stolen wings wide in a menacing way. Luna and I responded in kind, powering our horns up with arcane energy.

“And what will you do about it, huh?” Luna snarled. “You are powerless against us here, you can’t win. There is nothing you could throw at us that will bring us down.”

Platinum let out a mocking laugh at that. “Everypony has something they fear, ‘Princess’,” she shot back. Her magic pushed against ours, and to our surprise, it was starting to gain ground on us. Even with our combined strength, she was more... no, wait. She wasn’t more powerful, the nyx were helping her! “Even you two have nightmares! Ah ha ha ha!”

Our vision was overtaken by darkness until we could make out a faint light shining down from somewhere. In front of us was Celestia, battered and beaten, chained to the ground by the soul shackles around her neck and her fetlocks. 

“I’m all alone,” she whispered, crying in despair and her eyes looked straight through me as if I wasn’t even there. “Abandoned... by my own sisters...”

“That isn’t true, Tia! I...”—I reached out to her, but the nightmare kept her out of reach—” Please, sister. Don't think like that,” I said while my heart skipped a fearful beat as she continued to cry in her solitude. “We didn’t abandon you. We are searching the Canterlot Library for anything that could get you back... but there is nothing. Luna and I are doing our best to find a way to free you, I promise.”

“Sunny, she... she can’t hear you,” Luna told me, draping a wing over my back. “This vision isn’t real, it’s Platinum forcing us to see this.”

“No! No, this is her. It must be her,” I insisted, telling myself that it had to be true and hoping against hope for Tia to hear my desperate words. This was where she was imprisoned within that monster. I could reach out to her and give her the hope that we will come and save her. I have to believe that. I have to believe that she can hear my message, that she wouldn’t think... that, about me. I didn’t want her to think I have abandoned her. That... that I was unfaithful to her. “Tia, please be patient. We will come and save you, I promise. Even if it takes a thousand years, I'll be there to save you.”

“Such a heart-wrenching sight, isn’t it?” Platinum spoke with barely restrained glee as I cried for my sister to see me, just so that I could reassure her that this won’t last forever. “You can’t even help the one you love. What a pity.”

“You don’t understand what it means to love and be loved,” I said, turning around to give her a baleful glare. Even if Tia couldn’t see me here, even if that image of her wasn’t truly my sister, I knew she must know that I still loved her. And I still have Luna here with me, so I placed my horn against Luna’s lovingly, reassured that not everything was lost. Platinum hasn’t taken everything from me and I would make damn sure it would stay that way. Luna was mine. “Love is something... more. Something that you apparently don’t have. It saddens me, it truly does. For you won’t ever understand the power of love. That is the true pity here, Platinum.

“Love is the most pure thing in the world and when you are in love, you do things that might seem unreasonable. Being in love means that, sometimes, you have to let go. Do what is right and what is best. What you are doing, though, is as far removed from this pureness as it could possibly get.

“You are nothing more than a selfish brat, Platinum. You don’t deserve the form you have right now. You defile everything an alicorn stands for. You are a pathetic parasite, a disgusting leech. Your greed has cost me my sister and it will be a very long time before I can see her again, all because of you. So... be scared.

“Be scared for the day will come when you are going to get what is coming for you. Shake in your hooves in the knowledge that, whatever you throw at us, it won’t prevent this. We will come for you and you will be destroyed. You are going to be utterly and thoroughly destroyed to the degree that there won’t be anything left of you.

“You are weak, Platinum. Love will see us through these hard times, no matter what. Love will give us the strength to get our sister back from your dirty clutches. And what is it that you have, hmm? Nothing. That is your weakness. A weakness that will be your undoing, that much I promise you.”

With a burst of bright light, Luna and I shot a beam of condensed magic at her and expelled her from our dream. We could rest easy for tonight, stay with each other, and draw strength from our bond. Platinum, on the other hoof? She is probably going to stew in her anger and hatred like the pathetic weakling that she is. I have no doubt she would be back the next night, but for now, we wouldn’t be disturbed again.

This was a temporary victory over her, and as long as my subjects were safe from her machinations, Luna and I would bear the burden of her tormenting us in our sleep. She wasn't even that good at it, resorting to low blows, instead. Perhaps Nightmare Moon and Fallen Star should teach her a lesson or two on how to be scary...