It had been a long day in Equestria. Somewhere over Canterlot, two sisters brought about nighttime. The older sister’s horn glowed pink as she set the sun over the horizon. A thousand years of bringing dawn and dusk by herself had made the task effortless: she didn’t even break a sweat.
Her sister, on the other hoof, still had some difficulty raising the moon. A thousand years of being banished to the moon had taken its toll on her magical ability. After all, magic is like a mental muscle. The more it is used, the stronger it becomes. Much like muscles, magic also atrophies. Even after ten years of raising the moon, the younger alicorn’s magic was not as powerful as it had been previously. After particularly exhausting days, she was sometimes incapable of moving the moon at all without her sister’s help. This was one of those days.
With the two princesses working together, however, night fell within minutes. Smiling at each other, they set off on their nightly flight over Equestria. Being princesses, the two spent most of the day together with royal activities. Evening, however, was the only time they could spend alone, as sisters.
Circling the castle, the alicorns flew over the observatory of another princess, one who still spent her free time buried in books.
The lavender alicorn should have been sleeping at this hour, but instead, she was staring at the stars. Usually, she would have been charting the constellations, or looking for this or that astronomical oddity, but tonight she was lost in thought. While it wasn’t strange for the former librarian to be up late mulling over her studies, it was unusual for her to be lost in thought.
She had been missing her friends quite a bit recently. Shortly after Celestia had made her a princess, Twilight’s study on the magic of friendship had been concluded and replaced with a list of regal obligations. When she found the time between meetings and galas, Twilight visited all of her friends in Ponyville. Over time, the space between visits grew. The laundry list of responsibilities the new princess had was triple the original workload. The problem of finding time was only exacerbated by the fact that her friends had also become busier. It had been five years since she had seen any of them.
The lonely young princess wondered what her friends were up to. She wondered if they were happy. Did they miss her? Had they moved on without her?
Had she flown with her mentors, the lavender alicorn would have seen that the answer was no. At that moment, the two sisters flew past a cloud outside Cloudsdale, where a cyan pegasus lay on her back looking up at the stars. Anypony would have recognized her by her prismatic mane as Rainbow Dash, the Wonderbolt. Tonight, though, she just felt like Dashie. She knew she needed her sleep, and she was not one to take a pass on naps, but insomnia had struck Equestria’s best flier. The former Element of Loyalty missed her friends.
It had long been Rainbow Dash’s dream to become a Wonderbolt, and to fly with her idols. Now that dream had become reality, and she felt miserable for it. Her misery didn’t stem from her new job, which she loved, or even the Wonderbolts themselves. Since joining Equestria’s best troupe of aerial acrobats, Dash had seen her friends less and less often. She never saw Twilight anymore, and between workouts, practices, and shows, the pegasus had had less and less free time to spend with her friends. One time, the last time she saw the others, Dash had flown all the way from a show in Manehattan to Sugarcube Corner to surprise her friends. Instead, she had collapsed and crashed upon arriving, the flight being too much for even such an athletic pegasus. The entire week she had taken off was spent under the care of a worried Fluttershy. The normally quiet pegasus spent the greater part of their time together berating her flight school friend for pushing her limits so far. Dash wondered what her friend was up to.
The Element of Kindness, it turns out, was helping her pet bunny take care of his children. After Twilight became an alicorn and Fluttershy’s friends stopped meeting up as often, the reclusive pegasus had thrown herself into her work helping the local animals. It wasn’t as good of company, but it helped her ease her sense of loneliness. Some weeks into this increased workload, the caretaker was given a female bunny to take care of. Her front paw had apparently been injured running away from a predator in the Everfree. Angel had taken notice, but had tried to ignore his female counterpart. With some coaxing from Fluttershy, (and a few extra carrots offered) he began spending time with the female bunny. There is a long story there, but the short of it is that Angel, the formerly self-interested and greed-driven bunny, started a family with the girl (who Fluttershy named Halo, to fit with the theme.)
While a good deal of the time the pegasus had spent in the last five years involved Angel’s new family, she had also done other things. For instance, her family had invited her back to Cloudsdale for the last Hearth’s Warming Eve, in the hopes of forcing her to marry a suitor from another wealthy family. Although she felt pressured to comply with her parents’ wishes, she was able to assert herself enough to decline and got away. A shudder ran through her body at the memory. Her parents had cut her off after that, but that was okay. Between her animals sharing the food they had foraged, her own foraging, and Pinkie Pie’s help, she had plenty to eat. Speaking of the party pony, the two had spent a lot of time together at Sugarcube Corner since the others had left. A small smile formed on Fluttershy’s lips as she thought of their recent adventures, (and to the shy pony, every meeting with Pinkie Pie was an adventure).
Pinkie Pie was, as usual, breaking the laws of physics. She was bouncing excitedly on a cloud, waiting for the princess’ nightly flight. As she saw the white alicorn approach, (Luna blended in with her own night) the Element of Laughter began waving frantically.
“Hiya Princesses! Hey Celestia! Hey Luna!”
For their part, the sisters attempted to stifle amused grins. The pink earth pony had done so many impossible tricks over the years that it wasn’t even surprising anymore. Even less surprising to the alicorns was that Ponyville’s friendliest pony would somehow know the right time to be out to greet them.
“Hello Pinkie Pie,” Celestia and Luna said together. The two kept flying after Pinkie Pie came down from her cloud. Apparently, she just wanted to say ‘Hi’.
The Element of Laughter returned to her room in the Cakes’ house. She still lived there despite having the opportunity to move to Fillydelphia two years ago. Her claim was that she didn’t want to leave Fluttershy alone, but if she was honest, she was scared that she would be the one who was alone. After all, she knew everypony in Ponyville. If she moved to Fillydelphia, there was a chance that she wouldn’t be able to get to know everypony in town. Fillydelphia was much bigger than Ponyville, and city ponies were meaner than ponies in small towns. There was a chance that they might not like her! That possibility was unbearable, after going through the same situation on the rock farm.
Some of the older ponies in the community had not approved of her ‘parties’. Having lived their whole lives under the old rules and traditions of rock farming, those ponies saw no value in fun, and didn’t understand why the pink pony was so bouncy and energetic. They saw her as a distraction from farming, and so she had to leave home. Fortunately for her, Ponyville was not far and she was welcomed with open arms by the Cakes, who had loved spending time with her so they could get the scoop on the new mare. She had stayed in town ever since. Ponyville was home to her.
Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy supposedly hung out more now so that Fluttershy didn’t feel alone. What the pegasus didn’t know is that her friend needed her just as much. Since her other friends had left, the Element of Laughter had felt fairly lonely, and being extra-friendly to the customers at the Cakes’ shop hadn’t helped much.
What was interesting was that on the surface, Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy had almost nothing in common. Once they started hanging out though, common interests began appearing. For instance, the two had related elements. Kindness and Laughter both served as ways in which to make friends and get them to open up. The two each saw the best in others, but also had insecurities about the worst traits in others. They even shared some hobbies, such as singing and making food, although Pinkie’s focus was on ponies and Fluttershy’s was on animals. Their friendship had grown closer over the last five years, even if the others were starting to slip away. They weren’t quite moving on from the rest of the group, but they had come to depend on each other more and more, as Twilight, Rainbow, Rarity, and even Applejack left town.
Speaking of the honest, dependable pony, she was just getting to bed as night fell over Appleloosa. It had been a hard day of work helping her cousin Braeburn and his family. The town was still growing, and Applejack had been asked to help out there. Now that Apple Bloom was older, she was able to help out and more or less take Applejack’s place, with her friends’ help of course. Scootaloo in particular was helpful, now that she had become a skilled flier. She was able to fly by quickly, shaking most of the apples off the trees, which greatly expedited bucking season for the Ponyville clan.
Life in Appleloosa wasn’t bad. Applejack had always had a mind for the business aspect of running a farm, selling apples wherever she went. Here, she had an easy time selling to the buffalo, since the town had made a treaty with them, and the bucking season wasn’t too bad because the orchard was still a few years away from reaching the full size they had planned for it. Still, this wasn’t home to her.
She kept promising herself that she would return home next year. As the seasons passed, ‘next year’ always arrived with Applejack still on the farm. Family was the most important thing to the farm pony, and even though the ponies back home were family, so were cousin Braeburn and his relatives. Perhaps the most important piece of her family back home was missing-her friends. The Element of Honesty knew that the real reason why she never came back is because her friends were gone. If she went back, she’d spend all her time missing the others who had left, and that simply wouldn’t do. She’d missed Twilight’s knowledge of nearly everything, Rainbow’s skillful handling of the weather, and even Rarity’s frou-frou etiquette and way of speaking. Rarity. She had been the last pony keeping Applejack in Ponyville. Even though it annoyed Applejack to no end, she had to admit she had missed the cultured pony. The fashionista had gone to Manehattan to start a high-end boutique there. If Applejack had to guess, she’d assume that Rarity was working on somepony’s dress right now.
That assumption would be wrong. The city was full of noise at that hour, but none of it was coming from the boutique. The snowy pony instead sat by her window, staring at the late-night bustle of ponies walking home from nightclubs and one-night liaisons. Her mind was elsewhere, however. She, too, was thinking of her friends. As a pony of haute couture, it had always been her dream to design for stars like Sapphire Shores and Photo Finish, but the workload was immense. Arguably, she was working even harder now than Applejack. The wait time for a dress had stretched past three weeks, since she rarely turned down a customer and never raised the price. It would soon reach four if she continued her break, but at the moment, she didn’t care.
The last time she had seen her friends was at the Gala five years ago. Twilight was there with the princesses, wearing a dress that Rarity had modified to allow for her new wings. Rainbow Dash, who had just joined the Wonderbolts, briefly talked to her before rejoining her team to talk sponsorships with business ponies. Applejack hadn’t been there, learning from the last time that her apple goods likely wouldn’t sell well. Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie had spent the majority of the party together, with the party pony encouraging the shy pony to loosen up, while the shy pony tried to forget the last Gala. As for herself, Rarity had spent the whole time surrounded by ponies asking for a dress from her. She made enough in that one night to move to Manehattan, allowing her to better serve her new customers.
She hadn’t had the time for the Gala since then, with the orders piling up obscenely high in the month or so prior. In fact, that was why she was more than three weeks behind; she had received so many orders that she had to point people toward other boutiques. That hurt her pride a bit, having to admit that she didn’t have enough time for all of her customers. She didn’t even have the time to surprise her friends with their own dresses like she had planned. She groaned and flopped on her bed.
Her situation was far from the worst possible thing, but she missed her friends, and she missed Ponyville. The fashionista had even had to leave her sister behind in order to move. Sweetie Belle still had the boutique back home, in case she needed a place to sleep, but it still wasn’t ideal. As annoying as she sometimes was, Sweetie Belle was family, and Rarity felt awful for leaving her behind. At least her sister still had her friends, though.
Snapping her mind back to Manehattan, the Element of Generosity made a decision. As soon as the dresses for the Gala were finished, she was inviting all of the girls, and even Spike, to Manehattan. She would pay all expenses. It’s not like she was hurting for money: Even with her relatively low fee, the fashionista made a small fortune from her trade. They would see all the sights in the city, and then she would take them to one of her favorite restaurants. She smiled. Yes, that sounded quite nice.
The princesses finished their nightly flight, and after a goodnight nuzzle, they each went to bed. Throughout the land the ruled, six friends thought about each other. Twilight gathered five sheets of paper, heading each one with a name, and began writing five letters. Dash stared at the stars, making each cluster into a constellation of one of her friends. Fluttershy sat in her bed, thinking back on all her memories with the others. Pinkie Pie thought about throwing the biggest party ever, so big that the others had to come. Applejack stared out the window, her mind focused on her home town. Rarity began a list of everywhere she would take her friends when they arrived.
Eventually, they would all fall asleep. But for those few moments, they all stayed awake, not daring to sleep. Even though they were scattered across the country, for that moment they were together, under the same stars.