Uniting
It had been a long day for Princess Celestia. It was already night time so she flew out of a finished meeting and back to Canterlot Castle. She was weary and couldn't wait to lower the sun and finally get to bed. When she got to her bedroom, it was dark inside, but Celestia didn't really care how dark it was because she could still see, although the moonlight did bring some light into her room. Celestia went over to her closet and took off her golden jewels and shoes, putting them away. Than she went over to her bed and slowly drifted off - but not for long. When Celestia was almost asleep, she heard a voice. It was calling to her....
"Celestia? Are you there?" called a soft feminine voice.
Celestia opened her eyes, and she looked all over the room. But there was nothing. No one was there. She thought she must have been hearing things. She did have a long day, after all. She lowered her head, and closed her eyes again. And then the voice called once more.
"Celestia? Are you there, darling?"
"Is that you, Luna?" said Celestia. She didn't open her eyes. "Is this one of your pranks? If it is, stop it, cause it's not funny... Luna?" Celestia sat up. "Luna? Are you there?"
There was no answer. Celestia looked all over room again. There was nothing. She looked at her clock - it was 1 in the morning. Nopony could possibly be up at this time of night. Luna had already gone to bed. Celestia felt suspicious.
"Who's there? Show yourself!" she demanded.
"Very well...." said the voice.
Suddenly, in the center of the dark room, Celestia saw a bright light appear, from which a shape formed - the shape of an alicorn. It extended a orangish hoof with a starry violet horseshoe, then stepped into view. Celestia got out of the bed and took several awkward steps towards the orange hoof; her eyes began to widen, and her mind started racing. She briefly considered calling for help, but thinking both rationally and irrationally proved to be equally challenging under the circumstances, and the thought slipped away into a whirlwind of emotions. The pony stepped out of the light.. She had a nebulae cloud-like mane and tail, and a crown placed elegantly behind her horn; but she seemed to be covered in frost and shivering.
"Why hello." said the alicorn.
Celestia's pupils shrank to the size of dots, her once racing mind suddenly crashing to a complete stop. She drew a complete blank, too shocked by what she saw to even think rationally. Her mind tried to naturally kick-start itself with a simple command - she tried to repeat back the last word that was spoken to her.
Luna awoke suddenly. She heard the noises and she saw the bright lights coming from her sister's bedroom. The door to Celestia's room flew open at that moment. Luna dashed into Celestia's room, horn glowing as a light spell illuminated the dark room.
"Hey Tia." said Luna. "Why are you causing so much racket at this time of night? I was just trying to have a nice..."
Luna suddenly saw the alicorn standing across from Celestia, and after a few seconds of stunned silence, fainted on the spot. Celestia finally gains a conscious thought.
"M-mom?"
She closed her eyes and nodded, shivering off some of the cold. You could see her breath as she spoke. "Yes. I know it is a shock. But I am here."
"A shock?" By repeating those words Celestia's mind began to function somewhat normally again. "Luna thought you were dead! I thought you were dead! You've been gone for-" she looked to a clock on the wall, before realising it would be of no use - "five - six THOUSAND years! How could you?"
"I know it was a really long time, but, well, let us just say the circumstances couldn't have been much worse even without Discord fooling around like a jester in Princess Platinum's castle."
"Discord fooli-" Celestia frowned. "You leave me alone to take care of my sister, overthrow a tyrant, and rule a nation. Then you arrive thousands of years later and try to pretend nothing bad happened? I am afraid I cannot simply accept a 'let's just say' sort of excuse, I believe you owe us a serious explanation." Celestia waved a trembling hoof at the unconscious form of Luna still lying in the doorway. "Both of us."
"This frost is from travelling long distance - yes, I knew you wanted that explained too, Tia. But you're antagonising me. There was a great danger out there - I didn't want to leave either." She trotted up to Luna, examining her.
Luna opened her eyes, her vision slowly panning to her mother. When she recognized her mother a look of shock flashed through her eyes, followed immediately by a deeply painful sadness. Phantom tears flowed from her eyes as she looked up at her mother.
"Am I dead, mother? Are you here to take me to the world beyond?" asked Luna.
Luna's voice echoed with fear. Celestia remained silent. She looked down at the floor and attempted to appear lost in her own thoughts, hoping that the world would give her some time to find the ground she was once certain she was solidly standing upon. Now, even the sureness of her bedroom floor seemed unlikely to her, and her feelings about her mother were an equally uncomfortable mess.
Then her mother, Queen Luminata, lay down next to Luna. "No, you are not dead, dear. This is not the land of the dead. Ask your sister, Lulu."
Celestia turned her head away from both of them, her thoughts still a mess. Luna's eyes gained a sort of tired happiness.
"Mom, you came back! After all those years, isn't this good Tia?" said Luna. Celestia looked up and turned her head back to face Luna. "Tia! You always used to say it! You used to promise! Now you can finally keep your promise!"
Celestia stared at Luna blankly for a moment, before a single fell from her right eye. "Yes, you are right, sister, I can finally fulfill that old promise."
Queen Luminata looked up at Celestia. "A promise? Of what promise do you speak?"
"A very old one, mother," said Celestia. "Luna has reminded me of something I said quite a long time ago. Something I said before we had even defeated Discord."
Luna stood up and looked at Celestia, then began to explain. "When we tried to run away as fillies after father scolded us, all we had between us was my old wagon and that old picture of the family I loved so much. Discord was raining chocolate on us for days, so Tia had been pulling me around in my wagon. Suddenly, out of nowhere, one of the wheels of the wagon came off - and I fell out."
Celestia brought up her eyes to meet Luna's, and the corner of her mouth rose slightly before she continued on. "She landed in the chocolate flood waters, and kept relentlessly swimming through them in tears, pushing back the waves desperately. When she finally sighed and let me pull her back, I tried cleaning the chocolate out of her mane and fur, but she just kept crying. She just kept screaming that she had 'lost it', and I saw that she was broken hearted, but I couldn't see why. It took me far too long to figure out what that had meant - when the wagon had broken apart, she lost the picture in the chocolate sea." Luna gave her sister a warm smile before continuing the story.
"Tia searched for hours, used all her magic, and couldn't find it. I told her to stop after what felt like forever but could only have been half an hour, but she knew it was important to me. She was so sad that she had failed, and it was worse because that was all either of us would have left of you and dad when we came home a week later and found you gone. So we sat down, and she held me close. I said it was gone, that everything was gone, that it might as well have ended right then in the swirling mass of chocolate. Then Tia made me a promise."
Celestia returned Luna's warm smile. "I said: 'Luna, I promise you that when all of this finally ends, we will be a family again, and we will take better pictures, in a better time, and all of us will be together again forever.' I didn't think I could keep that promise." Celestia smiled, a proper smile this time. "I had given up, I never thought-" Celestia took a cautious step forward, an irrepressible happiness motivating her every move. A moment later she leapt into a hug with her mother, Luna right beside her. They both clung to Luminata as though they would never let go. "Mother!" Celestia's smile grew wider.
"Mommy!" cried Luna. Both ponies held her tight, crying tears of joy. For the first time since their childhood they were not merely princesses, now they were members of a family once more.
Their mother began to cry after what she heard. "Well... I'm so sorry! I didn't know that you would be so miserable when I left. I-I just. I just didn't know." She hugged the two. "I'm terribly sorry, so very sorry."
Celestia and Luna continued to hold the hug while they talked.
"It's alright mother, that was in the past, now we are together again."
Luna started to giggle. "You don't know WHAT we've had to do since you left."
"Luna..." said Celestia.
"Like that one time we had to fight off a hoard of zombie vampire bats."
"Luna,"
"Then Celestia fell into the lake of soul eating catfish, and-"
"Luna?"
"Then that seapony king demanded that Tia marry his daughter and-"
"Luna!"
"It turned out she was this giant dragon that demanded taking Celestia as her mate."
"LUNA!"
"And then some random weird demon posessed me and I turned into this crazy mare of evil and jealousy called Nightmare Moon, and Tia had to banish me to the moon for a thousand years, but her student and company defeated the spirit thing and got me back."
"LUNA, CAN YOU EVEN HEAR ME?"
"Yes, but I'm not stopping. Then Discord came back and the student and co. defeated him again. Then it was Nightmare Night and I changed my mane and came to Ponyville and said 'The fun has been doubled!'! That was cool."
"SHUT THE MOM UP LUNA!"
"Oh, but none of that matters now. The important thing is that we are all together!"
"Thank you Luna."
"Besides the giant dragoness bride to be."
Celestia sighed and buried her head in her mother's mane. Queen Luminata kissed her daughter's forehead, happy to be back with the two alicorns she loved most.