It was a typical school day for the fillies and colts of Ponyville. Save for a few, all of the students where sat in their respective desks, and the class room was as noisy as ever. It was before the starting bell so Ms. Cheerilee paid the noise no mind. Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle where arguing over some random topic while Applebloom pushed her number two wooden pencil around on her desktop. Her ears perked up when the metallic ring of the staring bell filled the air, quelling most of the chatter in the room with an exception of a few voices in the back of the classroom. Cheerilee got up from behind her desk and walked to the front of the room and stood before the blackboard.
“Quiet down fillies and colts, we have a very interesting lesson today!” She said with a characteristic smile. This finally put an end to the voices all across the room. She took a moment to make sure all eyes and ears where on her before she continued.
“Now we were going to continue our book reports.” A collective groan rolled across the room from everypony except for Applebloom. She raised an eyebrow after she caught the word were implying that they would not be doing the dreaded activity.
“But I have decided to push the due date back a day, and instead we have a guest speaker.” Now all eyes and ears where glued to the front of the room. Every kid in the room was filled curiosity over the sudden change in learning material. But before Cheerilee could continue a hoof shot into the air.
“Yes Twist?” the teacher answered the filly.
“Ith there going to be a testht on thith Ms. Cheerilee?” The fuzzy maned’ filly asked.
“I thought about it but I think it with it being a holiday weekend we could skip having a test.” A collective sigh of relief brushed across the class room.
“I bet it’s something lame like some kind of be yourself speech.” Diamond Tiara hissed to Silver Spoon. The grey filly responded with a nod in agreement. Ms. Cheerilee once again began to speak.
“Class, I’d like you all to welcome our own newly crowned Alicorn, Princess Twilight Sparkle!” Cheerilee introduced the guest in as grand of a manner as possible. The purple Alicorn trotted into the room, stopped next to Ms. Cheerilee and waved with a bright smile. She now had the chance to teach and inspire young minds. But before anything else received the chance to happen, the voice of Rainbow Dash was heard through the classroom’s side window. She leaned on the frame and chuckled as she picked on the introduction.
“Wow a princess! If I knew there was a princess in town I would have brought a cake! Oh hey twilight, so what’s up with all of this princess talk?” Dash smirked. A few desks away Scootaloo was staring starry eyed, mouth a gape in the shape of a smile at Rainbow Dash. The overly excited Scootaloo waved at her idol, and dash gave an acknowledging smile to the aspiring filly.
“Good morning to you too Rainbow Dash, care to say for a few, You just might learn something.” Twilight returned the sarcastic tone delivered initially by the cyan Pegasus. Much to Twilight’s surprise Rainbow Dash actually came into the classroom, pulled up a chair and took a seat.
“Well I was going to do some more late morning stunts, but yeah why not? What’s the harm?” Twilight was actually dumbfounded that her, almost anti scholastic, flight school dropout friend actually wanted to stay to listen to a lecture.
“Wow, really? I didn’t think you where into this kind of stuff Dash. I guess if I’m keeping you engaged, I might be able to have a hobby of teaching.” Twilight mused. A few seats away from Dash Scootaloo was now visibly shaking from her excitement. Rainbow Dash was in her class for a day. It took a moment before she realized that she was staring. Scootaloo mustered all of her will power to peel her eyes off of her idol and pay attention up front. Rainbow dash could sense the awkwardness in the air and just raised an eyebrow. The awkward atmosphere was sliced by Twilight’s words.
“Anyway, I am delighted to be teaching all of you about our planet’s history.” Twilight spoke with nerdy enthusiasm. She cleared her throat and began.
“Now, if you were to take a telescope at any time of night you might be able to catch a glimpse of any number of oddly colored planets out there along with the stars. Now does anyone know what a star is exactly?” Twilight was hoping the question would be rhetorical. A young colt towards the back of the room was the first to speak.
“There what comes out at night when Luna raises the moon.” He kind of sounded a bit like Spike, but younger.
“Well, yes and no. Luna doesn’t actually raise the stars, only the moon. Raising all those stars would mean moving the entire universe. Stars are actually enormous balls of flaming gas, not millions, but billions of light years away.”
“And, just how far is a lightyear?” Rainbow Dash cut in.
“A light year is the total distance covered by traveling light over the course of one year. So Say for example I was to turn on a flashlight and point it at the night sky. And let’s say you were on a planet exactly one light year away. If I pointed that light at you, it would take one full year to reach you before you would be able to see it. Keep in mind that if I was to turn that flashlight on in here the light would be visible instantly. Light can clear the distance between here and Canterlot so quickly that the time can’t even be measured by a fraction of a second. But for you to see a flashlight one light year out into space, you’d need one powerful light.” A few mouths where agape around the room.
“And while we’re on the topic of the moon, does anyone know why Luna needs to raise and lower the moon?” Twilight began again.
“B’cause’ if she didn’t we wouldn’t have night?” Applebloom spoke up.
“Again, not quite, assuming the sun went down you would still see the stars but the moon wouldn’t be seen. And no moon means no ocean tides, and if there are no tides, the ocean’s animal population would die. But that is another matter entirely. Luna raises the moon because it won’t move on its own. If you were to take a telescope, and have a look through it you would see that almost every planet out in space, is spinning. Because they spin, their moons orbit around the planet automatically. Our planet of Equus doesn’t spin, and therefore without Princess Luna and Celestia to raise the sun and moon one side of Equus would be in eternal night, and the other would be in eternal day.”
“But why doesn’t our planet spin?” Sweetie Belle chimed in.
“Excellent question, so far from what we know is that our sun technically isn’t even a sun. Many eons ago, back before pony kind even walked Equus, our little planet orbited around a central sun in our solar system, much like normal solar systems out there in space. There may have even been an entire race of life forms that once walked the planet. But as time went by the sun reached the end of its life and extinguished. Luckily the sun did not explode, or form a black hole so our happy little planet stayed intact. However, with nothing to keep the planets trapped in a steady, safe, and constant orbit, one of the planets went rouge so to speak and collided with Equus. This action put an end to our planet’s rotation.”
“If Equus was hit by another planet, then how come were sitting here alive? Wouldn’t that have killed everything and everyone?” Rainbow Dash interrupted.
“I’m getting to that Dash.” Twilight answered with a light tone of annoyance.
“The planet that hit Equus fractured our planet and left the other planet skinless. In short our sun is merely a molten core from another dead planet. So with no normal sun the planet made due with the molten core of the dead planet. However only half of the planet was getting this simulated sunlight, so only half of the planet was truly alive. As the saying goes, Nature will always find a way. So using the natural magical energy that Equus had, it attempted to create a species that could move the sun and moon. The first few didn’t work too well, but as the species evolved the first Alicorn emerged and attempted to move the new celestial bodies. Now because this took place so long ago, nopony knows for sure weather this pony was a mare or stallion, but some archeologists believe that, given the bone structure this was a stallion. Theories currently state that he was only able to start the sun and moon’s orbits and would not be able to continue this action more than once in his life time.” Twilight continued but paused to answer another question. A few of the more studious kids where actually taking notes, while a few artistically inclined ones drew pictures of the topic.
“Yes?” Twilight responded to a raised hoof.
“Why couldn’t the alicorn move the sun and moon more than once? Did he forget how?” the colt that asked was an Earth pony. Twilight gave a light friendly chuckle as she began to answer.
“Well you see, Alicorn magic is basically a more concentrated Unicorn magic. So seeing as how preforming large feats of magic is heavily taxing, I’d say getting the sun and moon in motion was all he could do. See magic is like running, you can only run so far so fast before you have to stop and regain your energy, and moving two planet sized rocks is quite the task. But fortunately getting them moving initially is the hardest part. Seeing how there is no air resistance in space, once they start moving they’ll keep in constant motion.” Another hoof found its way into the air above the white unicorn filly Sweetie Belle.
“Yes?” Twilight responded.
“So If the sun and moon will kept, and will keep spinning after this stallion alicorn set them in motion, why do Celestia and Luna still need to raise and lower them?”
“Well, that’s due to the forces of constant motion, they will keep moving yes, but they may not stay near Equus its self. If their paths are not constantly monitored and adjusted they could either leave their synthetic orbit or worse, hit the planet.” Twilight was interrupted again, only this time it was not by a filly, nor Rainbow Dash. Ms. Cheerilee was the one to speak.
“I have a question. If one Alicorn was able to do the job of getting the sun and moon moving initially, which you said was the hard part. Why is it that we need both Celestia and Luna to do the easier job of correcting their orbits?” Twilight smirked at the thought provoking question.
“I’m glad you asked.” Twilight leaned on the table at the front of the room and answered.
“Evolution and energy conservation, you see the first Alicorn only lived half of a normal pony’s lifespan after getting the celestial bodies moving, it was that taxing. So, to compensate another pair of Alicorns where brought into existence. The two would share the job of moving the sun and moon, that way they would live longer and they could manage the satellites better than any one Alicorn ever could; these Alicorns where the parents of Celestia and Luna, who according to records ruled for approximately three thousand years, Celestia and Luna in the last eighty years of their lives. Now if you’re an Alicorn from birth you are technically immortal, you don’t age after you reach adult hood. You still get older, but it will not show.” Another hoof in the air, this time from Rainbow Dash, she raised her hoof instead of blurting out whatever she had in mind. Twilight had managed to bring out the inner student that nopony knew Dash even had.
“Yes Dash?”
“If that’s true, then why is it that Celestia clearly looks older than Luna? I know she is literally older but if they are both of adult age, and you say their appearance will not change after the adult age is reached, why is it that Celestia has aged further than Luna?” Twilight mentally went slack jawed then kicked herself for doubting her friend’s intelligence. She cleared her throat before answering.
“Well, if you recall Celestia was forced to take over Luna’s job during the thousand year banishment. The extra exertion of energy counteracted the agelessness of the immortality.”
Now Scootaloo raised a hoof.
“Question Scootaloo?” Twilight mused, the look on the filly’s face lead on to it being a troubling question indeed.
“So, if Celestia and Luna have only ruled for one thousand years, and their parents lived for three thousand, that means there is still two thousand years between now and when Equus will need more Alicorns. So why is it that you and Princess Cadence are Alicorns now? Wouldn’t it stand to reason that any more Alicorns should have come along a long time in the future rather than now? I mean if you or Cadence are supposed to take Celestia and Luna’s places in two thousand years, that would mean your lives would be two thirds of the way over before you ever get to take on the job.”
“Wow, good question. While I don’t know the exact answer to that one I have thought about it myself, and I have come to this conclusion. Cadence and I are Alicorns with the task of building relationships, and while the title of “Princesses of Friendship” is still flakey to me I’ll take it on with honor and pride. But I theorize that we exist to keep banishments among Alicorns from happening in the future. If I do my job and Cadence hers, ponies would have no need to fight, thus Alicorns would not take sides against each other and Celestia and Luna’s replacements could do their jobs without any one Alicorn having to bear the task of both sun and moon. Back in the day Star Swirl was supposed to have been an Alicorn, but after Celestia discovered he was secretly involved with the rebellion of Nightmare Moon she forbade it. Again I’m not sure if it’s true but it’s the only way I see the pieces of the puzzle fitting together. Cadence and I tend to relationships among ponies, while Celestia and Luna tend to the sun and moon.” Twilight finished just as the bell rang. But to her surprise the children didn’t move, they waited for her to give the word. The purple Alicorn glanced around the room before speaking.
“Well, it seems the school day is over, I’m glad I got the opportunity to teach and answer questions you may have had. I certainly had fun and would be delighted to come back again. You have all been a great class. Have a great evening!” Twilight dismissed the class, and they all calmly got up and left the room. Twilight turned to face Ms. Cheerilee.
“Sorry if I took up any lesson time from your teaching schedule.”
“Are you kidding? This class has never been more engaged in any lesson for as long as I’ve been teaching here. You ought to come back more often. Or here’s an idea, let’s trade jobs! I’ll be Celestia’s star pupil for a while and you teach the class.” The two mares laughed at the idea, though one of them was faking for the other’s sake. Then Twilight spoke up again.
“Out of everypony here I’m more surprised that I got Rainbow Dash to actually participate in a classroom setting. If her studying for her Wonder Bolts test has any vindication she’s typically really bad in a classroom scenario. Not to be mean but it’s true.”
“You’re right Twi, I suck at school! I don’t know how you do it but your egg-headed-ness must be contagious.” Rainbow Dash was leaning back in her chair. Twilight could only smile, she was successful at getting Ponyville’s most difficult student to sit still and participate in class. She felt she could make a rock understand calculus.