That was the single most amazing dream she'd ever had. And the funny thing was that she could remember every single detail of it, down to the last star that passed by her at dizzying speeds.
Twilight woke up in her bed, having been fed the the cosmos through her head. It was amazing, and that word in itself was an understatement when it came to describing the dream. She saw gas giants, terrestrial planets like Equestria, planets that were covered with ice but had water underneath that crust of ice, planets that were dotted with volcanoes that spewed channel-burrowing magma. And in her imagination spaceship there was a flight announcer, telling and explaining the cosmos to her, star by star, planet by planet, moon by moon. As to who this flight announcer was, she couldn't tell.
But she knew one thing. All of this information far contradicted her understanding of the heavens from the hundreds of books that she read on astronomy alone; the stars didn't determine the comings and goings of life on Equestria as astrology taught but they were just stars with planets, like or unlike Equestria, orbiting them. That was a compelling fact. The planets orbited the stars. The stars weren't controlled by magic to go around their planets, much like Equestria's own sun was. Or... was it that way? She had never questioned Celestia about this matter.
The announcer was male. He had a voice, wasn't too deep, wasn't too high, that was brimming with excitement, excitement that came from educating others on the intricacies of the universe, and that voice sounded absolutely certain in the facts that it shared. Twilight flew around in the spaceship of imagination, as her knowledge about the universe and her relevance for its chaos and order grew and grew. She learned about planets with huge, layered rings around them, and moons that orbited these planets which provided the moonlets that largely constituted these rings by far-reaching geysers.
At one point in the dream, they zoomed out from the view of the Universe. She learned that the observable Universe was over 40 billion light-years across, and she learned that the actual term light-year measured distance, not time, and it was the amount of distance covered by a beam of light in a single year. And that term, year, according to the announcer, was 365 days. And a day, according to the announcer, was 24 hours. And it went on and on, the facts strikingly similar to Equestria's own measurements of time. Twilight didn't know all of this, and it pleased her so as the answers where given to her by the announcer, right then and there, in the spaceship of imagination. At one time, she had even asked the announcer where Equestria was in this entire scheme of things.
"Right there," said the majestic voice, and at that moment, they were looking at the microwave version of the Universe. A yellow circle was drawn in the empty space, and it was so... insignificant. Twilight requested a zoom.
Upon further inspection, Twilight learned that there were 13 planets in Equestria's solar system, not the five planets initially speculated, partly due to the fact that telescopic technology of the time was greatly limited. In this line of 13 planets, Equestria was third from the Sun, and the only one that seemed to have life. And they orbited the Sun of Equestria. Not the other way around, for any one of the planets. It was contradictory to her beliefs at the time, and the consequences of propagating such a belief was... unimaginable. She could even be one of the few ponies in the entire history of Equestria to be put into prison! It was dangerous to consider yet... it was logical, given the concept of gravity that was described by the announcer and the fact that stars are rarely smaller than planets, and that the position of the stars in the sky changed throughout the Equestrian year. It was clear from that one dream that everything that was being taught to Equestrians about the heavens was wrong.
She got out of bed and galloped quickly into the observatory of her room. She wanted to test these things out, but unfortunately, the observatory was gone, since Tirek wrecked the treehouse; this was the new 'treecastle' she had made. She had to wait for the observatory in her new castle in a couple of weeks. Twilight groaned, and slumped as she sat down on the floor of one of her castle's corridors. She could always build one with her magic, but with the limited knowledge on telescopes at the current time, there was no time to do so.
But she knew. The compelling evidence was with her. She galloped back to her room, a large area overflowing with books from shelves sitting against the walls of the room, with just enough space to fit a bed and a bedside desk, and an actual, tiny study desk on the wall opposite the wall against which the bed leaned on. She took out a phone receiver from the tiny black telephone on her bedside desk and attempted to call someone, anyone, to inform them of her dream, but at that moment, the phone itself rang.
"Hello?" said Twilight as she answered the call.
"Princess Twilight! W-we hope that this is not one of the many calls you've r-received!" said the voice at the other end. Male, sounding highly anxious and high-pitched.
"No. In fact, you're probably the only people who have called me in the last 24 hours," she replied. An Equestrian day is 24 Equestrian hours, she reminded herself, so very similar to the announcer's world.
"Good, good, good. S-sorry for the lateness, but would you mind giving the f-f-first message through the television? It would be an honour for the Princess who single-hoofedly saved the magic of Equestria to do so!" said the stallion, his voice shaking at times. Twilight rolled her eyes.
"Oh please, that's too kind. You're forgetting the contributions of my friends, Discord, Celestia and Luna. Anyway..." said Twilight as she pondered the request. This was the first time the invention of the television was going to be unleashed to the world, and she witnessed the marvels of the television first hoof at Electronics Equestria, the main hub for electronic technology development on the planet. Twilight herself was impressed, and as a celebration of the saving of Equestria from Tirek, the recently invented device, which was meant to televise messages and imagery from a single broadcasting station, was installed in all homes which had occupants willing to have it installed.
But back to the question. Never before had Twilight felt so connected to the universe from that one dream. And never before was she so eager to share her gained knowledge with others, so that they, too, could feel amazed.
"Yes...?" said the stallion, his nervous breathing coming through the receiver. The implications could be dire as well. Twilight decided, she couldn't hold it in.
"I'll do it. Fact is..." said Twilight, as she reached for a pen and a notebook from her bedside desk, always there for emergency situations. "I'll do up an entire TV program, if you would allow it."
"A TV program...?"
"It's like, I'll extend the message and add in some additional special effects so that every pony has my attention. I mean, who wants to see a princess just talking, right?" added Twilight. "Oh! And TV should stand for television."
"That's great!" blurted the stallion. "Do you need any help on this project?"
"Nope. All the effects would be made by me. It's easy. Don't sweat it!" replied Twilight, and before the stallion could reply, she slammed the phone down.
She had to find out the truth, and it sure as heck didn't lie within her library and its archives, of whose contents she had read at an average of three times over. She had to go to Canterlot library.
She remembered trying to get here in a tight black suit in the night. She tried forgetting that. But, she was now much, much wiser, and could use magic in the best of ways to find her way into the library and get what she wanted. True invisibility spells used to be alicorn tier, but she was now a skilled alicorn. Silencing spells were easy too, so she could find her way past the nimblest of batpony ears. And so she applied the relevant spells onto herself and flew up to the window of the highest tower where the Canterlot library was located.
Using magic, she scanned the titles of the thousands of books, and found out that thousands of them had been read by her already. A select few were extracted but formed a measly pile of 25 books, 15 of which were about topics not related to astronomy, and six more of which dealt with astrology. She peered through the four remaining, but even then she couldn't find a single sentence about heliocentrism in them, with the majority of the books describing observations of planetary transits, and calculations or estimations of the awesome magical power required to lift and put down the sun and moon. The lack of works on astronomy that existed in the libraries of Canterlot was appalling. But this few couldn't be all. She unleashed a magical pulse to map the surroundings, and found a secret room at a far-flung, forgotten corner of the library. On it was a large word that read 'Restricted'. Unfortunately, there were two guards that were posted at the entrance, and were probably from the elite batch of stallions hoof-picked by Luna to patrol the castle at night, who could smell, hear, see or even taste an intruder from miles away.
She inched towards the Restricted section, and saw that the two ponies weren't asleep as she'd hoped, nor were they alert on their hooves.
"Stop right there!" cried one of the bat pony guards, and the other one jolted up with a shout. This scared Twilight out of her wits, but luckily her magical precautions didn't betray her. They couldn't see her, could they?
"Haha! that look on your face!" cried the bat pony who shouted the admonition in the first place, and the other one punched him painfully in his obsidian plated shoulder.
"That wasn't funny, guano," spat the other, and Twilight would have been fooled into thinking that that term meant the other guard's name had she not read "1001 Things You Need To Know About Bats", a bestseller amongst the bat-admiring community.
"Buck yes it was!" roared the misbehaving soldier. At this rate, Twilight wasn't going to get through to the restricted section without their noticing. There was a magical barrier around the place, she was certain about it, and she couldn't risk trying to lift it on her own. So she released all of her spells and placed a mind manipulation spell on the two guards as fast as she could. The two were reduced to drooling, white-eyed ponies under her control.
"How do I get in?" asked Twilight. The ponies didn't say anything, but the cursing soldier reached for something in his armour and pulled out a key. It glowed a shade of purple, and Twilight grabbed it with her magic, inserting it into the keyhole of the room. She could feel a great magical pressure lift, and the door swung open with a groaning creak.
"Sleep," she whispered, and the guards dropped to the floor. The restricted section was a room that had shelves on two walls of the room, left and right of the entrance door, and across the entrance door was a portrait of Starswirl the Bearded. In the middle of the room was a lone table with a chair. She went through the same process as before, scanning the book titles, and found that all of the books in this section were unknown to her. Sifting through them, she singled out the ones which bore titles that were remotely related to astronomy and set them down on the single table, speed reading through the contents, the light on her horn acting as a magical reading lamp. As she read her first one, she realised that she had about 60 more to go through; a staggering number compared to the astronomy books present in the main library.
Of the 60, a large number was authored by Starswirl the Bearded, which was 12. A fifth of the astronomy books in this section was authored by the ancient stallion himself, which was weird to Twilight since his most brilliant works concerned magic. She never knew that the pony was interested, at all, in the stars in the sky. The words 'heliocentrism', 'orbits', 'Suns' and most compelling of all, 'doubt' appeared much more frequently in these works. She couldn't stop digesting them, as she read on through the lonely night, her reading mode drowning out everything as she continued. Turns out, the announcer of her dreams made validated claims according to the works she found, and she didn't understand how that was so. That would mean that Celestia truly didn't carry the Sun with her magic; even doing so would be preposterous, since the Sun's mass is so many more times larger than Equestria. She could be in big trouble for even trying to spread that claim. There were also some recent letters, kept away as flimsy old pieces of yellowed parchment, that were saying that Saddle Arabian technology is far more advanced than Canterlot technology, and that they accepted 'heinous' ideas of the planets and the Sun. Twilight was shocked when she found out that Celestia was bribing the Saddle Arabian ministers to keep their technologies restricted to their own country.
Then, there was the most interesting book in the whole section. It was called 'Starswirl's Journal' and in it held drawings of stars, their positions in the night sky on certain dates, magical spells and diagrams on magical incantations and magical artefacts. But that wasn't the main attraction. It was the following passage:
I had shared my findings with thy king and queen of Cantlot, but thy company heeded thy ideas with no little amount of scorn. And so thy king and queen gave up their eldest daughter, the ebullient and radiant Celeste to thee, for thee to remain silent. Not to tout thy own horn, thy magics were far greater than any, so any were at thy mercy. But I did accept thy king and queen's deal, out of respect for thy king and queen's wishes. But it was to thy ruin, since aftwards, thy purity was sullied and thy once scientific mind was eroded, much to the evils of the dark temptress hidden beneath the veil of purest white...
Twilight couldn't read on. She could accept heliocentric theory, suggestions that Equestria's Sun was just another star, but she couldn't see Celestia as a... seductress who destroyed Starswirl's fervour for knowledge. But... she had to.
Twilight found herself glowing many shades of red at the following explicit, definitely non-scientific descriptions of Starswirl's nights with Celestia. And the stallion seemed very proud when he described them. Just before she got to the (literal) climax of a certain scene, she detected faint hoofbeats in the distance, and she broke out of her reading mood. She shelved all of the books hastily in the order she remembered them to have been in, rushed out of the room, locked the door, and woke up the guard ponies. By the time she had done that, though...
"Twilight?" came the stern voice of Celestia. Outside, the Sun was rising, bringing on the deep blue of dawn. The bat pony guards talked to themselves for a moment before leaving their posts, and Twilight was right outside the restricted section as the bat ponies bowed to her on their way out of the library.
"What were you doing here?" asked Celestia, her eyes squinted in suspicion, her head motioning towards the restricted section. "Did you go in?"
"N-no..." said Twilight, hoping that Celestia wasn't using a lie detector spell on her. Twilight had her head down, and couldn't view the princess in the same light again after reading that... account of absolute debauchery! Not only that, but the claims pointed to Celestia being a science restricting tyrant whose agenda was still being pursued up to this day. She couldn't, she wouldn't... accept that Celestia was evil.
"Were you trying to look for something regarding time travel again?" Celestia said with a sly smile, smirking. Maybe that was the same look she gave to Starswirl before going down on... no! Twilight looked up to face her, and noticed the lack of the glowing horn on Celestia's head and the Sun that was rising gradually in the East. She had to accept the truth.
"No, princess," said Twilight with a smile. "I was looking up material on botany. There really wasn't anything in my library that could satisfy my knowledge on the species of tree that my old house was hollowed out of. Turns out, I genetically mutated that tree with magic!"
"That's a certain... bit of news," said Celestia. Twilight had gone back to looking at the ground, unwilling to look at her princess. Celestia, though, couldn't help but notice. "Is there something wrong, Twilight?"
"No! it's just..." said Twilight, after a while of pondering. "I'm a little nervous. You see, I'm going to be talking to the ponies everywhere through television, you know, that recent invention?"
"Oh yes! I was there. Can't say that I'm looking forward to it, though," said Celestia.
"Why not?" replied Twilight.
"Well, I think that this technology could lead to rather dire consequences. What happens when things on the television become... I don't know, too interesting? No pony would want to go out and enjoy the life out there that's been created for them," said Celestia. Twilight's eyes widened; rejection of technology?
"Maybe. Oh! I should prepare the script! Sorry, Princess, gotta run! Heh," said Twilight as she flew out of the castle, heading straight for her new tree castle at top speed, eager to get out of the castle as soon as possible. Celestia frowned, her eyes never leaving the purple alicorn.
At her study desk, Twilight was still staring at the blank piece of paper that should have held the script's words. For up to five Equestrian hours, she had just been staring, thinking of the words she had read in the past few hours. In between those hours, there was a call from the nervous stallion from the night before telling her that she had to come down to Equestria Electronics to broadcast her message. But she didn't know whether she'd have a message to send.
Actually, she knew that she did. She couldn't tell anything other than the truth, but the truth hurt. It would hurt the scientific community, the elite in Canterlot, and most of all, it would hurt Celestia. The more she thought about it, the more she wished she didn't agree to this broadcasting thing in the first place. She looked at the wall clock above her study desk, and saw that there was about 10 minutes left to her broadcasting time. No problem, she could just teleport there. But her mind was empty as she willed herself to go to Equestria Electronics' recording studio, right in front of the camera, a large, black, rusty instrument with a looking glass staring at her. Behind her, there was a dark, completely black background with stars on it, supposedly capturing the scene of a dark, starry sky.
"W-woah! The princess is here," said the nervous stallion, an orange maned, yellow coated pony with a red and green checkered scarf around his neck, a thin build, and a pair of blue glasses atop his nose. All of the ponies in the studio bowed their heads at Twilight.
"Y-you're too kind..." said Twilight, as the clock on a wall of the recording studio indicated that there were seven minutes left till the broadcast. It was like looking at an executioner's axe slowly come down upon one's neck. Then, she was certain that she couldn't say what she had learned, she just couldn't. It wasn't physically possible for those words to form. A tear started forming in her eye. As if on cue, some ponies in the studio immediately reacted.
"Tissues! Anypony has tissues?" cried the nervous stallion, and there was movement all around the studio.
"No! Don't, it's fine," said Twilight in a slightly broken voice. The clock indicated five minutes to go. "I'm just... aware of how influential my following words will be. It's probably going to go down in history as... important, somewhat. The little fillies and colts' dreams will probably be affected, for better or for worse."
"Princess, it will definitely be for the better. After all, your judgements saved Equestria!" exclaimed a young crew member, and then there was applause for Twilight. She didn't bother refuting that claim.
"Hey, will this be broadcast in colour?" asked Twilight. The nervous stallion shook his head.
"We don't have the tech for that. Not yet, at least," he said. Twilight sighed. The ponies in Saddle Arabia probably had coloured images moving in their TV screens. Just two minutes left to go on the clock.
"Hey, what is your name?" asked Twilight.
"M-me?" replied the nervous pony.
"Yeah."
"Call me Video Checkers. I've been fascinated by the very concept of moving imagery my entire life!" Video Checkers said, his initial nervousness gone. Twilight nodded, a smile on her face.
"You'll definitely be remembered in history as well," she said. 30 seconds to go.
"Aw, thank you Princess. But I'm doubtful. Anyways, you're live in..." he said, eyes on the clock.
"Five, four, three, two, one and we're on!" he said, flicking the switch on his camera. Twilight gulped and then started talking straight off of her head.
"This is Twilight Sparkle, and I'm here to give the first ever telecasted speech. Before I proceed on, though, I think that it is worthy to mention the name of my camera manager, Video Checkers, who made all of the arrangements without which this message wouldn't be able to come to your household television, or TV as I like to call it, sets. And also to Princess C-Celestia, who is doubtful that technology wouldn't be able to change the world of Equestria for the better, that I'm very, very sure that it is going to help ponykind for generations to come, not only for Earth ponies but for Unicorns and Pegasi as well, since we are all disadvantaged with respect to each other to a certain extent and through technology can we bridge such disadvantages.
"Now, onto the speech proper. This is about Dreams a-a-and Beyond w-what we know. Um... The Universe out th-there is much larger than even our wildest imaginations can think up. There is... not much that we understand about it, that's for c-certain. However, a-as all of us are scientists to a certain extent, we should reject any form of dogma, meaning to say, we shouldn't have any preconceived conclusions about what we're trying to explore, since we know nothing about our destination, or whether there's going to be a destination at all. The important word I'm looking for is... is... is doubt. Yeah, that's it. Doubt is what encourages us to explore the world, in my opinion. Which is why, when I look and study the stars, I just... can't accept that... can't... accept that they move around us. *gulps*... That everything was put there for our viewing pleasure. Look at it this way. See the *cough* excuse me, see the brightest star in the sky, Beta Centaurus. You'd recognise her immediately since she is in a cluster of three in a triangular shaped constellation.
"Beta Centaurus was at one position in the sky during one month, and the next half of the Equestrian year later, it was at a completely different position in the sky. This is a problem known as stellar parallax, a phenomenon so small yet it is still a problem; this proves that Equestria is... is orbiting the Sun, since there is a change of position of Equestria. It's also an idea that's been in my head for a while, that Equestria is a sphere that rotates about its own axis..."
"We've been cut off!" Video Checkers cried, as the camera gave a loud whirring sound, sparks flying out of it. "Damn machine!"
"It's not the machine's fault, Video," said Twilight, as she looked out the window for a brief second, then closed her eyes for the next second. She had detected the magical pulse earlier, and knew that wrath was coming.
In the third second, the window shattered and in flew two pegasus guards; from the looks of their armour, it was apparent that they came straight from Canterlot. Their presence set off pandemonium, and the crew members were sent galloping away from the scene. Twilight knew that they were coming for her.
"Princess Twilight Sparkle, you are found guilty of treason and for being a heretic, and you are to be in Celestia's chambers at once!" announced one of the white-furred guards. Twilight didn't resist, and had a defiant frown on her face.
"I don't need you two," said Twilight, and she teleported up to Celestia's chambers, where the white alicorn was at her study.
"Oh, Twilight. Did you really have to say all of that?" moaned Celestia as she dipped her quill in ink.
"I couldn't help it, Princess," replied Twilight, her voice still a little shaky from before. "I had to say... the truth."
"The truth... the truth? How would you know that was the truth?" said Celestia softly, still writing that letter of hers. "I've lived for far longer than you have, and I'm your teacher. I would never--"
"Thing is, princess, your claims aren't very credible," said Twilight, her voice rising in anger. She had to do this. For Science. Even if it meant betraying the trust of her teacher and friend. "The most powerful? Not to a bug pony powered by Shining Armour's love. You still haven't explained that incident to me. And true, you are older, but that doesn't affect the credibility of your claims. I'm not going to believe in the claims of some pony who rutted away the scientist in Starswirl the Bearded as his whore."
"WHAT!" cried Celestia in her Royal Canterlot Voice, her eyes widening and her pupils dilating. The once serene princess who was initially working at the letter at her desk was revealing her true colours. With not so much as a demand for an explanation, she teleported Twilight away into a prison, a dank, filthy place with only three walls and several bars where the fourth wall should have been. She seemed to be the lone occupant of the prison. Celestia teleported to the outside of the prison, a frown deep as a trench etched onto her face.
"Twilight Sparkle, you know too much," declared Celestia, whose voice was quietening down but still had a tinge of anger behind it. Twilight tried to activate her magic, but to her horror, realised that a temporary ban was placed on her magics, indicated by white spikes that were protruding from the surface of her horn. Try as she might, she couldn't release it.
"I am going to steal your magic, Twilight. Rot away in this prison in the coming days. In a week, you will be put to death surreptitiously. I'm sorry, my student, but the Restricted Section of the library is restricted by a 'uber' level magical barrier for a reason," said Celestia, in that same serene voice that she always used with Twilight. The white alicorn opened her mouth, her eyes whiting out as Twilight felt a tug on her magical being, coaxing her essence out. Twilight wasn't going to resist, though, and her face had a great frown as the painful process was being carried out.
The next few days were the worst she'd ever spent. There weren't any rats or filthy animals of that ilk, but there might as well have been. The silence was killing. There was no night sky to look at, either. But, she spent those days thinking about the books she'd read in her life, and using her hoof she made some calculations in the floor and the walls of her prison. Random calculations proving random things. Whenever food came through a hole in the wall, it was usually well-made; Celestia clearly had some memory of the student she had taken under her wing once. But that student was gone. Twilight refused to eat, and the condition of her body deteriorated to a veritable stick. Then, on the fourth day, Princess Luna dropped by for a visit.
"Princess Twilight?" Luna said. The princess' face was forlorn, quite unlike the angry countenance of her sister a few days before. The gaunt form of Twilight found its way into the meagre light of the prison.
"Are you here to take away my wings, too?" asked Twilight angrily. Luna was probably on the same boat with Celestia, and she couldn't be trusted. But maybe she wasn't. Twilight was still a scientist, albeit a starved one, and had to consider the possibilities.
"No. I'm here to discuss about you and my sister. Just... how did you know?"
And so Twilight told Luna the entire story. She didn't find a need to hold it back, since there was really nothing to lose. She was on the way to the end, after all. The whole time, Luna didn't falter in her attention, listening intently to what Twilight had to say. Twilight thought that Luna would be surprised by the dream, but she wasn't.
"I had a hoof to play in that, regrettably," said Luna after Twilight finished her account.
"How so...?" asked Twilight, though she knew the answer.
"I placed that dream inside your head," said Luna. "I know things that my sister knows but doesn't want any pony else to know. I've been on the moon. I've observed Equestria and its movements, for a thousand years to boot. But I couldn't risk getting sent to the moon... again. I wanted every pony to know the unknowable, and I thought that you were the best pony to make that wish so. But... I'm sorry, Twilight."
Then, for the first time, Twilight saw Luna break down in real tears. Twilight wanted to reach a comforting hoof over to support Luna, but the bars restricted her from doing so. She could only watch helplessly.
"Luna... Look at me," said Twilight, with a radiant smile. Luna did. "That dream was the best one I could have had. I think that Equestria would surely be a better place if every pony had such a dream. Say, what gave you such an idea?"
"It was... a machine, of some sort, which I saw drifting in space while I was on the moon. It was a vessel from another planet, I'm certain. It contained a video, and that video was basically your dream. With a few configurations from me, of course," said Luna, a smile on her face that reflected Twilight's. Luna used her horn to teleport five cupcakes into Twilight's cell.
"Eat up, Twilight, while they're still hot," said Luna. "And I assure you, the coming days aren't ones to be worried over, trust me. There is a plan."
With that, Luna vanished. Twilight stared into the space she left for a moment, before she bit into the cupcake.
And then, on the seventh night, Twilight was dragged out of the prison after the bars had been lowered. Though nourished on a daily basis after the fourth day by Luna's generous helpings of food, Twilight was still very frail and weak, partly due to the removal of her magic; magic wasn't just a power that was available to unicorns, it was one of the pillars that supported their physical wellbeing. So thus the guards dragged her out, painfully through the long winding halls and staircases of the intricately designed prison. Through the numerous corridors of the Castle, which was connected, and into the courtyard of the castle, a cobblestone path in the shape of a cross with green grass in the spaces in between, and in the middle of the cross, was a pile of wooden sticks strung together to form something like a bonfire, and there was a wooden post sticking skywards in the middle of it. The whole courtyard was surrounding by high, rocky walls, so no one outside could see. Everything went by in silence, with Twilight too weak to protest anymore. After being securely tied, Celestia swooped down from the skies and leaned in, snout to snout with Twilight.
"Any last words, my student?" she asked. Twilight could never, in a million years, imagine the pony she revered as a mentor, the pony she sent letters to for 3 years, the pony who recognised her magic in the first place, sneering down at her. But Twilight felt no ill towards Celestia, and Twilight smiled.
"Now that I'm out here in the courtyard, where all the stars and galaxies are present to me, I have to thank you for allowing me to see the universe you did not have a hoof in creating, nor did any pony in existence have any hoof in creating," Twilight whispered, a hoarseness in her voice. "Now that I'm here, I'd like to say this, and you have to remember: In this moment, I am euphoric. Not because of your phoney blessings or teachings or what not, but because I am pleased by the revelation of the intricacies of the universe by science, its dichotomy of chaos and order, its very existence and stability despite and in spite of chaos."
Celestia grunted.
"Fire up the wood," said Celestia as she turned her back on her student forever. The guards obediently followed orders, and a torch was carried by a guard, who, as revealed by the light of the torch itself, had tears streaming down his face. Twilight seemed to be taking this a whole lot less seriously than the guard himself, who looked up at Twilight, eyes red and glistening. She smiled.
Suddenly, the torch was lifted up high into the air and thrown away into the night, much to the surprise of the guard and all who witnessed it. Twilight didn't need a prompt on who it was; the sound of rope whistling past her face was unmistakable.
"Applejack! This is dangerous," said Twilight in as loud a voice as she could manage, but already the ropes around her hooves were hastily coming undone.
"Ain't nutthin' too dangerous fer us!" said Applejack as the guards ran away. Celestia's attention was caught and she turned towards the ponies.
"Argh!" cried Luna in the distance as she tackled her sister to the ground from behind. "Run, my ponies!"
"Rainbow! Now!" cried Applejack, and even in the dark of night, it was possible to see the flash of colours that was Rainbow Dash swoop down from the starry night and grab both Applejack and Twilight in her hooves and fly them away from the scene at alarming speed.
"Woah! Twilight, you're much lighter than I remembered!" cried Rainbow Dash.
"Don't be so insensitive ta her! She's been through too much," reprimanded Applejack as the sight of Canterlot Castle grew smaller.
"It's alright..." said Twilight quietly, as the night sky consumed her vision of everything but the stars and galaxies that the grand tapestry of the sky bore for all life forms in and out of Equestria to see and marvel at.
What happens afterwards to Twilight and friends is not very relevant to the wellbeing of Equestria. What is relevant, is the piquing of the curiosity of the young in Equestria as a result of the few, short minutes that Twilight was allowed to speak to the entire world of ponies. That was a message: When exploring the world, doubting is the main way that scientific progress can ever be made. This is because the universe is so vast, whatever conclusions that are made beforehand, especially claims made without credibility, could very well be easily disproved. It is hoped that Twilight sparked off a generation of scientists who found the same folly she found in the teachings of Celestia, and thus would rebel and find eventual peace through non-violent debate, to coexist or not with the tyrant.
Whatever the outcome is, it should be known that nature is out there, and that she is always available for study by anyone.