//------------------------------// // Darkness Under the Sun // Story: Shattered Magic // by EpicGamer10075 //------------------------------// “Your security is still terrible.” Those just had to be the first words she heard from that mare after everything, didn’t they? Celestia sighed as she stood on the balcony adjacent to her room, slightly tired after raising the Sun while Tempest Shadow trotted over, bereft of armor yet having defeated no less than a dozen guards to get into her room uninvited. “I’d ask you what is so urgent, but... I know this was barely a trouble for you.” “It really shouldn’t have been,” Tempest stated as she arrived at the side of sovereign Sun, only somewhat winded herself. “But... I did want to ask you something. Something that’s... been on my mind for a while.” Celestia’s eyes went over to the mare and she saw the deep questioning look on her face, and to her, it was all too familiar. “Fourteen years ago, you pleaded for me to restore your horn. I turned you away.” “..Why?” The Unicorn responded firmly, hardly sounding surprised at the recollection. Looking between each other for a moment, Celestia then just looked away and replied, “There wasn’t--and still isn’t--any way I’m fully aware of to fix one’s shattered horn.” Of course, Tempest easily caught the subtext of it all. “There are ways though, aren’t there?” There wasn’t an immediate response, so she continued pressing, “Even if you didn’t want to actually fix my horn, you still could’ve done something. Maybe some sort of augment to fill in what’s missing, or just let me stay here for a while so that a literal staving foal wouldn’t have to get kicked out of the Palace and live on the streets, scrouging for scraps and--” “I KNOW!” Tempest flinched back at the sudden shout, with Celestia glaring back at her, but with eyes not full of rage, but instead aguish. “I... I know how much of a mistake that was, especially because have been put through the consequences of that just recently!” Celestia elaborated, the added defeat and sorrow clear in her faltering poise. “...Twilight Sparkle,” The Unicorn paused a moment before stating, and watched as the immortal before her flinched at the name alone. Taking a heavy breath in, hardly able to hide the tears in her voice, Celestia tried to respond, “I’ve dealt with consequences for so long... even the tiniest of mistakes can slowly build into something I can’t stop after I’ve finally noticed it. It’s happened so many times... my sister, the Changelings, Discord, and now you...” Letting a beat pass in thought, Tempest then asked, “And how many of them could’ve been stopped if you went out of your way early to fix them?” Celestia didn’t reply—verbally, at least. It was all too obvious in her wide, unfocused eyes, however, that most of those ‘tiniest’ mistakes were indeed a series of major failings to actually hold the livelihood of other creatures that may be suffering in high regard. “I do hope that this will now finally make you realize how essential looking out for those you’ve failed truly is.” The Alicorn gulped in response, tears now visible in her eyes as her breathing only became more heavy and despondent. “Now, tell me, Celestia,” Tempest spoke, returning the conversation back before the tangent, “Are there ways to fix a horn as broken as mine?” It took several seconds of uncomfortable silence, marred only by the worn breaths of the anguished Alicorn, before she hesitantly replied, “..Yes.” “Why didn’t you tell me back then?” Tempest asked, a tint of rage underneath her firm, but well-controlled mannerisms. Sighing in a way that was almost desperate, Celestia eventually answered, “The process of healing something so tied to one’s magic... requires dark magic.” “And why did you not tell me, or try to do anything else to help me?” The Unicorn’s voice was still carrying that undercurrent, but she now spoke with some level of comprehension. “Because...” Celestia tried, her voice waning as the tears in her eyes only flowed faster, “Because I had made another terrible mistake before you came to me.” Keeping her silence for some time, Tempest started to understand the root of the problem, and let the other mare stew in her horrid memories before eventually resuming. “I-I am not... trying to excuse myself from what I forced you into to... but...” Celestia spoke with her frail voice, and had to avert her eyes in regret as she started to elaborate, “My previous student... before Twilight, was...” Her head lowered as she clenched her eyes, more tears pouring out. “S-she suffered because I couldn’t... see her properly. She had... issues, but she was...” As the other mare trailed off, unable to finish her statement, Tempest decided to say the harsh truth; “You were manipulating her, and unlike Twilight, she wasn’t gullible enough to fall for it. When she called you out...” She paused for a moment as the Alicorn shivered in horrible understanding, “You denied it, and she used what you taught her against you.” Celestia nodded wearily, and replied, “She was learning about dark magic. ...Behind my back, she learned about the power I was keeping from her, and when I denied it from her...” She laughed, short and dry and utterly mirthless, “She timed that all just right, and went through a portal to another place I couldn’t follow.” Tempest kept her steel gaze on her for some more seconds, debating how to respond to such massive mistakes on the Princess’s part, but she knew one thing; “And from there, you couldn’t trust anyone you couldn’t control.” Wincing at the accusation, Celestia took a breath and shook her head. “N-not quite. I was afraid of Twilight falling into darkness for a while too...” “...And I can guess,” Tempest continued, with the other mare closing her eyes to brace herself, “That that fear is what led to you keeping her by your side so heavily, and not urging to get out until it was nearly too late.” A small, shaky nod was all Celestia could reply with, though the tears still flowed down her face. The Unicorn pulled her own gaze away to stare out across the capital of Equestria laid out before her, keeping silent for a while. Eventually though, she had to ask, “How long?” At Celestia’s look back over at her, confusion clear in her expression, Tempest clarified, “How long did it take for you to actually trust Twilight?” The Alicorn’s mouth popped open, but she didn’t have an answer ready. She had to look away and reflect for a few seconds, but then... “I never did.” Tempest jerked her attention over in surprise. “What?” “I...” Celestia tried, but shook her head and grunted, all her emotions getting the better of her, even more than before she admitted herself. “Have you...” She pivoted, looking back at the other mare, “Have you heard of what happened at the Royal Wedding?” Tempest nodded, intrigued and worried. “The Changelings, yes. You were nearly all captured if not for your sister.” Nodding and wiping her tears with a foreleg, Celestia smiled for a moment, more genuine as she replied, “Yes, my sister is a hundred times the warrior I am now...” But her smile quickly faded and was replaced by her guilt and horror, and she stated, “But she wouldn’t have needed to do as much as she did if I actually trusted Twilight. She had her suspicions about Cadance, and I brushed them off, thinking the stress and paranoia about the Changelings was getting to the both of them, but all I really needed to do to stop their invasion was just... check.” Tempest left the silence for a moment before asking, “I was wondering about everything there, and why you simply didn’t delay the wedding if there was the threat of a Changeling invasion upon you all.” “Cadance—or, Chrysalis, really—was insistent that it go on, and really should’ve thrown me off, but...” Celestia answered, grimacing and glaring down at the floor, clearly angry at herself, “I trusted Cadance’s appearance more than Twilight’s words.” “...How about your sister?” “Luna...” The Solar mare’s expression shifted into something less readable, but she seemed to be thinking. “Luna was out, watching over the city to make sure there weren’t Changelings about. I didn’t want to distract her...” Tempest shrugged, assent that that reasoning was more sound than the rest of her logic thus far. However, that one event was hardly all there was to Twilight, so she asked, “And how did you feel about Twilight after her ascension?” Celestia blinked, the silence remaining for a while as her face remained completely unreadable except for the fact that she was in deep thought. “I...” She eventually started weakly, though her expression didn’t change, “I was... still afraid of her to a degree.” “That she might use her new power to betray you?” Celestia nodded in affirmation. “I was that way with Cadance for a while, but it was more complicated with her.” Looking back at the other pony, she elaborated, “Because Luna wasn’t there, and I was... both more afraid of a new Alicorn, but also trying to cope with my sister by using Cadance.” Raising an eyebrow, Tempest just shot back, “Well that didn’t end up amounting to a lot, given how it took another Kingdom appearing out of thin air before you installed her as your puppet there.” “I—” Celestia glared harshly at the Unicorn. “That is not what she was!” “Well, you clearly haven’t noticed, ‘Princess’,” Tempest retorted, keeping her own expression level despite the venom in her words, “Just how eager she is to please you, so any decision she makes is always going to be filtered through, or at least based off of you, so she might as well be another power grab over a Kingdom that you can’t properly understand the needs of.” Celestia just growled at her, flaring her horn. “I’m already angry at myself for losing Twilight due to my uselessness in a fight. You don’t want to kick me while I’m already down.” “That’s right, Luna had to buy Twilight and her friends some time to get away...” Tempest muttered in response, not even flinching at the power aimed straight at her head that only grew with the anger her statement incited. “I suppose her return and everything she’s done has just shown how far you’ve fallen in her absence, and how badly you need her to balance yourself out now that she’s back.” Tempest closed her eyes and took a deep sigh, then looked back at the rageful mare before her and stated, “Look. All I’m trying to say here is that no creature is perfect and we’ve all made mistakes, some far worse than others, and some of those mistakes truly cannot be fixed. So, what we must do instead is atone for them and make the best of what we have now. I don’t know if you’ve noticed, Celestia, but...” She lowered her head, the cracked stump of her broken horn shimmering lightly in the light of dawn, “I’ve fucked up a lot, too.”