Twilight skewed an ear at the immobile egg, as most eggs tended to be. "Barb, congratulations."
Barb lifted her egg with a triumphant smile. "This is silly," she admitted with a soft sigh. "Just an egg..."
"Doesn't have to be." Twilight sat next to Barb. "You started as just an egg, I will remind. Celestia thought you were entirely lifeless, or she wouldn't have had random foals zapping you with their magic." She made pew pew noises and flexed her hoof through the air in demonstration of the blasts. "And yet..."
"And yet..." Barb moved the egg into her full vision. "She doesn't have an egg anymore, right? Maybe... I could give her this one. Probably nothing'll happen... but it's a nice thought, that something could, maybe... And, uh... if it does, I'll be here to greet them..." Unlike her own parents, she didn't say out loud, though the meaning echoed clearly to both present.
Twilight wrapped a wing around her little brother. "We'd both be there. They'd be a part of our family, if it happened." She leaned in, touching nose to cheek. "But let's not get too focused on that. You're hoping for another little filly like me."
"Small odds," admitted Barbara as she carefully set the egg down in its nest and got out some paper to start writing.
Dear Princess Celestia,
It's Barbara! Oh, did you hear yet? I was Spike, now Barb. Um... Part of that included laying an egg, which I did...
She flushed red, writing that. "Do you think Celestia will be alright with this?"
Twilight's mind whirled with a few doomsday scenarios, but she shoved them aside. "From.. what I've seen, she'll accept this a lot faster than I did, and I'll feel foalish."
"That's big of you to say." Barb continued writing.
So now I have an egg, a dragon egg, obviously. You don't have one of those anymore, so I was thinking to gift it to you. Maybe some new unicorn foal will make it hatch? Wouldn't that be nice? Um, anyway, I'll send it a few minutes after this letter, so be ready for that. Oh! Actually, send me a letter back when you're ready.
Yours Faithfully,
Barbara Dragon
Barb folded the paper up into a scroll and with a woosh of flame, sent it off towards Celestia. "Way better than just... throwing it away." She made a disgusted expression at that. "I don't want to do that."
Twilight considered with a curled hoof at her chin. "Well, I get the idea that's exactly what a lot of dragons do." She smiled down at her little sister. "But you care more than most dragons, and that's part of what makes you special, in a very good way."
Barb colored at that. "It... also makes me the softest dragon."
Twilight hooked a leg around Barb, hugging close. "I'll take my soft and wonderful dragon any day of the week. Besides, you get serious when the situation calls for it. It's just that an egg is not that situation."
Barb would have replied, but she hiccuped and coughed instead, belching out a returned ornate scroll. She grabbed it from the air and unfurled it.
Congratulations Barb,
I confess, I did not see this coming, but you have clearly taken a large step in your life and I wish you the best of fortune in navigating it. An egg, you say? I feel I should warn, eggs placed before foals may not always survive the experience. It wouldn't be proper for you to not be entirely aware of that. While we can hope for another miracle, it's far from assured. Are you certain? If you are, send the egg. I will wait patiently for ten minutes, in case you send it. If not, I will presume you are keeping it. You are a dear friend in either event. When the day comes that you lay a quickened egg, I hope I am invited to celebrate that special moment with you.
Wishing the Best,
Princess Celestia
Barb giggled softly, hugging the letter. That felt just as important as the legal proof. Celestia saw her, and recognized her. "Hm..." She put a hand on her egg. "It isn't... completely safe..."
Twilight rest the side of her head against Barb's. "This may not sound like me... but nothing is, in the end."
"Yeah..." Barb drew the egg closer, sliding it on its bedding. "It has better odds than if I just stare at it until it... Yeah..." She drew herself upright. "Better a small chance than no chance at all." With a puff of enchanted flames, she sent her egg and its bed off on its journey to a sliver of a chance, where before it had none. "This is... kinda dumb though." She threw up her hands behind her head. "Until something happens... It's just an egg. I know that, you know... up here." She tapped at her head.
"It's not as easy to know that here." She tapped at her chest and its rebellious heart. "But thanks. That was a great idea."
Twilight shared a gentle hug with Barb. "Glad I could help. Sorry for being... kinda distant about... everything. This isn't a promise that I'm suddenly better. As Fluttershy would say, babysteps. I want to be there, for you. You're still my sibling, and my #1 assistant. I care about you, a lot..."
Barb hopped away from the hug. "You're taking things at your own pace." She winked with a smile. "If you just rolled with it, I'd ask who you were and how did Chrysalis sneak you in when I wasn't looking?"
Twilight wrinkled her nose, rolling her eyes with a huff. "Barbara Dragon!" Barb went stiff. "Your full name still works, I see... Still, really..."
"I'm just joking around." Barb stepped away from her throne, done with it for the time. The two laughed as they headed off out of the map room. "You going to be at my big name reveal?"
"Of course I will be." Twilight turned her eyes skywards. "Perhaps as good a time as any to have it completely down. As your sister, Barb, it would be quite improper for me not to be there."
Barb swung around in front of her. "One thing."
"Hm?"
"It was a little time, and you were, understandably, upset..." Barb held up two fingers close together. "But you were there, for a moment. How was the other side of the fence?"
Twilight peered at Barb, understanding absent a moment before a snap of realization replaced it with a dark and rapid spread of color. "Barb! I... didn't have enough time to consider it, just that I was suddenly very much not what I was normally and to be upset about that. Thankfully, Discord undid his little trick." She let out a slow breath. "But if you're asking if I'm curious, only on a scientific level, and I had that long before he was involved. I am quite comfortable being a mare. Which I hear you are too?"
"It's pretty great, minus the confusing new parts, but I'll get used to that." She patted her belly, no longer holding an egg for the moment.
"So are you curious about going back to being a guy dragon?" gently teased Twilight with a sly smile.
"No! I... Oh." Realization dawned on Barbara. "I get it... Sorry..." She skipped backwards, facing Twilight and going the opposite way. "I'm not trying to be a jerk. This is a really small club I'm in, me and Big Mac. I was just... kinda curious if you were in it too."
Twilight inclined her head, following Spike at that sedate rate. "Considering my sexuality? No, I'm comfortable with mine." She hummed. "Actually, there is one part still undecided."
Barb perked at that. "Do tell!" She pantomimed zipping her lips. "I won't tell if you want me to keep it a secret."
"Thank you for that... This is between you and me." Twilight closed, nuzzling between Barb's legs and casually tossing her up onto Twilight's back. "So it's like this..." She twisted an ear back at Barb. "I feel silly even discussing this... No offense, but you're a little young for this."
Barb crossed her arms with a flat expression. "I may be young, but I laid my first egg. It's not like I'm entirely clueless, Twi."
"Yes, well, true... but also you have had no experience... Rarity didn't let you get... intimate... did she?" Her raised brow was hint enough that she hoped this was not the case.
"Uh... She let me help her a lot? We went mining, like, all the time." Barb waved her hands in the air in wild pantomime. "We hung out all the time. Is that... intimate?"
"Not that sort of intimate." Twilight relaxed under Barb. At least that was avoided. "Which is my point. What I'm talking about is that kind of intimate, which you aren't very familiar with. Ah!" A thought came to her. "Think about our parents. The hugs, the kisses, the closeness they have that isn't quite the same as two good friends. You've seen that, hm?"
"Sure, yeah?" Barb shrugged helplessly. "They're all lovey dovey..."
"Correct. Now... Most ponies have a clear idea of who they want to be 'lovey dovey' with. That was true even for you. You wanted to be lovey dovey with Rarity, did you not?"
Barb shrank at that. "Yeah..." Not that she wanted to talk about that failed romance that moment. "What about it?"
Twilight curled a hoof to point at herself. "I don't know who I want to do that with! I don't... even know what kind of pony I want to do that with. " She grunted with annoyance. "It's not that I'm against the idea, but I really don't know where to start, and I get distracted with other things so easily..."
Barb stroked at her chin softly as they arrived in the kitchen. She hopped free to the floor. "Hm! I think I get it."
"You do?" Twilight moved to the fridge, gathering what could become lunch with some effort. "What do you get?"
"It's like me." She hiked a thumb at herself. "I used to want that... with Rarity, but that's been, uh... busted? Is busted the right word? Um..." She fidgeted nervously a moment. "Best I got. Now who? I don't know! Do I... Am I...? I'm a dragon mare now! Do I look for a stallion? I'm not used to even thinking like that, so that's new..." She sagged with a low chuckle. "And I only know how to romance Rarity, and apparently wasn't that good--"
Twilight put a hoof to Barb's lips. "Don't say that. You were quite good. I feel quite confident in saying that Rarity will never forget the time you two spent together. You did nothing wrong."
Barb buried her face in that hoof. "Thanks," she mumbled into it. "It's hard... but I think I get it, what you're saying. That kinda thing isn't the same as friendship. Don't get me wrong, friendship is pretty great!" She pulled back from the hoof and went to sit at the small table in the clean kitchen. "I love my friends a lot. It's a different kinda thing with a special somepony, or creature, or dragon, or..." She tapped her fingers together. "Speaking of that... A lot of dragons I've met are kinda... abrasive, but not all of them. Like Smolder's pretty great! But she's also my big sister, so that'd be super awkward."
Twilight smiled at Barb's meandering thoughts. "Maybe I was wrong. You do seem to get what I'm talking about." She set some food on a pan, sizzling it gently with her magic to wriggle it about. "Seems this is a difficulty we can share. It would be nice, perhaps, to be on even footing on this. There's been so much you or I have been ahead of the other on. Perhaps on this we can step forward together?"
Barb smirked at that. "Not literally together."
Twilight paused, figuring that out. "Barb! No." She stuck out her tongue. "Not that kind of together."