***
Twilight reached over the cover of the bed, a wrinkled hoof gently squeezing her lover's. Despite herself, she gave a weak smile, blinking back her teary eyes as she tried
"You don't have to be here, you know."
"Of course I do."
A brave sniffle came from Twilight's snout. She gave a cough, her body wracked with spasms for a moment. A face beside her creased in concern, but she waved it off.
"You don't have to do this. Think about all the ponies you've helped. All the ponies you can keep helping. Think about your friends. Think about your famil--"
"I have thought. And there's no place I'd rather be. The life I have led has been too long already." A cracked and broken sigh escaped her lips. "Too long altogether."
"But..."
"I've already passed on my spells. My policies and books and thoughts. I'm ready, and I've made my decision."
"But...what if you're wrong? What if there's just nothing. Don't go. Not just for my sake." Another cough wracked the other mare's body. "Please! Just leave me! I'm not worth this, Tia! I made my choice, but you don't have to!"
Twilight looked into the sagging, puffy white-grey eyes of the Princess of Equestria. A fat old mare, now pudgy both from cake and from her stomach muscles sagging, lay draped in a peaceful, magnificent bed. Her limp mane, no longer as pink as it had been forty thousand years ago, lay over a wrinkled face a gentle smile ghosting across it. All Twilight could see in those haunted eyes was kindness. A silent wish.
"Oh Twilight. My Twilight. I'm so old. Heh. Not like you didn't know that. I have been...heh...waiting for a time when I could let go. I have lost so, so many in my life. But I couldn't stop until I knew that the lives of all those who came after me would be just as magical, just as blessed as ours have. Now at last we've won. Don't you see? They don't need their godesses anymore, our little ponies. And it's all thanks to you."
Twilight's eyes pooled with tears. "You know, all these years and I still don't understand. Why me? Why was I different, or better? To drive you to this?"
There was that kind, gentle smile again. "Twilight, my deares--" Celestia broke off into a wheeze, her chest sagging and falling slowly. "You made me feel again. Oh, it had been eons since I'd met a creature who was so earnest, who felt so much as you. And for me. Not for The Princess. Everything you ever did, you would offer to me in a heartbeat. How could I not open up to you? You deserve this. Because, Twilight Sparkle, you loved me. With all of your heart, and for all of your life. In a way that any creature would be blessed with. I still wonder what I did to deserve all the gifts you gave me. Letters that let me remember what it was to be a pony again. My sister. The safety of my subjects. Your love."
Twilight opened her mouth again, but Celestia cut her off with another cough as she tried to speak.
"I know you're going to try to get me to stay. But Twilight, I'm ready, don't you see? You're growing old. I've seen so very much in this world. It has been so beautiful, and so cruel, and I have loved every minute of it. Nothing has compared to what I've shared with you. It was...like honey. It never tarnished, never went bad. As I grew accustomed to it and let it age, it only crystallized into something solid. Time with you was the sweetest thing in life. I have no duties here. No friends who will not be able to accept my passing. Luna may follow us, it is her choice. But you are chasing after your friends, in surrendering your eternal life. Wherever you go, I will follow you."
Twilight swallowed.
"And before I set out to leave, to find my old friends and families, and there are so very many, I have one last thing I'd like you to do for me."
Twilight's awareness snapped forward. "Anything!"
"Read me those letters. Read me the story of our lives. Please."
Twilight swallowed. She could see that Celestia's eyes were growing dimmer. She could feel the blood in the hoof she held slowing its passage. She had, she imagined, an hour. She opened a box, and pulled out a scroll. Blinking back tears, she read out to the world.
"Dear Princess Celestia."