Princess Luna peeled back one bloodshot eye to stare into the blinding light shining through her drapes. She frowned and lifted her head from her pillow, a string of drool on her chin.
“That is… odd,” Luna mumbled, the sunlight outside her covered windows seeming to grow with every passing second. She shook herself awake. “More than odd, that is just unnecessarily bright.”
Sluggishly exiting her bed, Luna trotted to her chamber doors and threw them open. She eyed the closest guard. “You there! Sweaty guard pony! What is my sister doing, disrupting my sleep with her over-bright sun?”
The guard came to her, visibly panting in the sweltering heat. “Princess Luna? I thought… I thought you would’ve left the castle by now.”
Luna frowned. “And why is that?”
The guard bit his lip, another bead of sweat trickling down his head. “Because, well, Princess Celestia has become a tyrant! An evil tyrant! She’s been calling herself Sunny Skies all morning!”
Luna cocked a brow. “My sister has become a tyrant? Since when? I had breakfast with Celestia just two hours ago before I went to bed.”
“Well, I guess that’s when she became a tyrant. She raised the sun and said she wouldn’t lower it—ever again! Then she said ‘You’d all better go get Luna to try and stop me!’ and then she laughed and laughed.” He paused for a moment. “Or, more like a chuckle. Like when you think of something sort of funny, but then remember it’s not that funny once you really start to think about it. Not a very villainous chuckle, anyways. And she has on this black armor that—”
Luna shoved her hoof into his mouth. “Where is she now? The tyrant known as Sunny Skies?”
She retracted her slobbery limb. “Ponyville.”
With her horn, Luna levitated over her battle armor and helmet from her chamber and snapped them in place. “Then let us see what has befallen my sister.”
***
It didn’t take long for Luna to track down Celestia in the center of Ponyville’s marketplace. All she had to do was follow the trail of curious townsfolk and guttural chuckles from the tyrant she had been searching for. Angling her horn to the burning sun above, Celestia appeared nearly identical to her former self—the only differences being a blackened cutie mark and the few bits of dark armor around her hooves and chest. Her usually kempt and flowing mane and tail appeared like she’d just exited from a wind tunnel.
“Celestia!” Luna exclaimed, making her sister turn. “What has made you this way?”
Celestia glared at her and lowered to the ground. “For too long have these ponies been taking my beautiful sun for granted, never realizing its full force! Now, I have become Sunny Skies! The one alicorn that will make sure daylight lasts forever!” She laughed into a hoof. “No more rainy days! No more starry nights! No more cloud coverage or anything of the sort! Nothing but bright, burning sun for all of eternity!”
A lone stallion from the crowd around the pair poked his head out. “You mean no more rain, or snow, or hail, or chilly days where you wish you’d brought a scarf?”
Celestia stomped an armored hoof. “Never again!”
The stallion grinned. “Then that means we can have picnics, like… every day now! Wow! And no rain or snow? I’ll save so much money on umbrellas and snow shovels! Thanks a bunch, Sunny Skies!”
Celestia’s maniacal laughter died. “Wait. You do realize the horrific ramifications of having nothing but endless sun for the rest of the year, don’t you? I mean, with no rain, that alone means Equestria’s farms would—”
The stallion already had his back to her. “Sorry, can’t hear you! Gotta go shopping for a new picnic blanket! I hear it’s gonna be a scorcher today!”
Celestia’s mouth dropped open as she watched him happily leave the marketplace. As her eyes found Luna’s again, she steeled herself. “No matter! You may not understand the horrors that are coming your way, but soon it will all come to light. Like sunlight!”
Luna divided the distance between them. “Whatever this is, Celestia, stop it immediately and return the sun to its rightful location. I wish to return to my morning nap posthaste.”
Celestia shook her head. “I’m afraid there is no Celestia left to be found here. There is only… Sunny Skies! So I wouldn’t hesitate before taking action, Princess. Anymore heat and the citizens of Ponyville will start clamoring for all the freshly squeezed lemonade they can get. And I highly doubt they’ll be able to keep up with demand! Looks like the only course of action is for Sunny Skies to be sent directly to the moon!”
Then she laughed. Or, at least, chuckled loudly.
That last line gave Luna pause. She glanced at Celestia’s flank and blackened cutie mark, as well as all the paint splotches surrounding it.
Luna furrowed her brows. “You haven’t gone evil at all, have you?”
Celestia scoffed. “But of course I have! Look at my armor! And look at my mane! It’s all… messy and junk. And haven’t you heard how much I’ve been laughing lately?”
“But your coat is still white. When I became Nightmare Moon, I changed dramatically—both in spirit and in form.”
Celestia rolled her eyes. “What can I say: Sunny Skies likes the white look.”
“You were worried it would stain your coat, weren’t you? So you only painted over your cutie mark.”
Celestia blanched, hurriedly covering her plot with a wing. “Lies! Do not try and reason with the likes of me! I am evil incarnate! I am the Princess of fire and death! Unless I am dealt with accordingly, I will swallow the souls of every last citizen in this land!”
A group of fillies and colts holding half-eaten ice cream cones strolled past the pair. On the way by, one of them hugged Celestia’s front legs. “Thanks for such a nice day, Sunny Skies! I got to go to the waterpark and eat an ice cream! And now we’re going to have a picnic! This is just the best day ever! And all because of you!”
Celestia awkwardly shook her leg until the foal detached from her and went on their way. She gritted her teeth and shot daggers at Luna. “For every minute that Sunny Skies in not sent to the moon, I will bring the sun closer to the ground. I would not think too hard on what options remain, Princess. There is only one! Swift, fast, gentle banishment to the moon!”
With a hoof, Luna scratched at her chin. “Knock it off, Tia. I know exactly what you are trying to do.”
“Good!” Celestia shuffled herself two paces to the right and spread both forelegs wide. “Then hit me with everything you’ve got and take care of Sunny Skies once and for all.”
Luna waved a hoof. “Nah. I would rather not, actually. Not for a single second do I honestly believe my sister has grown evil. No. If I remember correctly, it was only a couple of weeks ago she was lamenting about how nice a vacation sounded. A rather long one, if I am not mistaken.”
Celestia stared at her hooves. “Celestia… I mean, Sunny Skies does not follow you.”
Luna pointed a leg at her. “You just want to vacation on the moon, don’t you?”
Celestia blanched, her mouth working on words that never came.
Luna’s eyes popped open as something else came to her. “That is why things have been going missing from the castle! The mini-fridge. The kitchen pantry. The royal beanbag chair. The ping pong table. All those music records I had in storage. You sent them all to the moon.” She thought for a moment. “How were you going to play ping pong by yourself? Better yet, is that where Sweet Berries went? Your personal chef? Celestia, did you send Sweet Berries to the moon!?”
Celestia pursed her lips and whispered to her, “You didn’t think I’d be making my own cheese omelets on the moon, did you?”
“Ah hah! I knew it!” Luna shouted triumphantly, before lowering her voice to not be heard by the crowd. “So all of this—all of this Sunny Skies business—was all an attempt at getting sent to the moon?”
“Maybe.”
“For how long were you planning on staying there?”
Celestia’s cheeks reddened. “A thousand years, give or take; depending on how I was enjoying the place.”
“You do realize that I was not actually stuck on the moon, but rather in it, right?” Luna grumbled to her.
“That’s why all you’d need to do is shoot me onto the moon.”
“So you could have a vacation all to yourself and leave me in charge of everything in your absence?”
“Well…” Celestia chewed on her tongue. “You kinda did that to me a thousand years ago.”
Luna roughly clicked her teeth together. “You think I became Nightmare Moon solely in the hopes of going on a thousand-year-long vacation? One-way ticket, all expenses paid for by my sister!?”
Celestia’s cheeks deepened into crimson. “Didn’t you?”
Bringing a hoof to her temple, Luna exhaled. “If you wanted some time off, why not just take a regular vacation? Go explore the Griffon Empire or somewhere no other ponies would bother you. Why bother becoming a tyrant and ruining your image?”
Celestia snorted. “Ruin my image? Please. A thousand years from now, no pony will remember what happened here. And those that do? They’ll welcome me back with open legs. Haven’t you noticed how popular you’ve become since coming back? Ponies like a flawed Princess. It lets them know they’re far from perfect and more relatable to them.”
Now it was Luna’s turn to blush. “I am… popular now?”
Celestia rolled her eyes. “I’d show you the latest Princess poll, but the rankings make me mad enough as is.” She sighed. “So you want to help me out already and send me to the moon? My masseuse has been waiting for me up there for quite some time now.”
Luna lowered her head in thought. “Did you send the castle’s pinball machine to the moon, too?”
“I think so. Why?”
Luna smirked. “A vacation sounds nice, actually.”
***
“Go away and get off my lawn! Go away, the both of you! Right this instant!”
Twilight Sparkle held onto the railing of her castle’s balcony, looking down at the pair of “tyrant” alicorns below. The fresh black paint that created most of Luna’s Nightmare Moon costume lazily dripped to the grass below.
Celestia held a leg up to Twilight. “Not until you send us both to the moon, Twilight! Remember: on the moon and not in the moon.”
“Yes!” Luna added, a deep echo behind her voice. “As well as this stack of pizzas next to us! They, too, have become tyrants and deserve swift justice! To the moon, I say! To the moon with all of us! Before Sunny Skies and I start destroying even more of this peaceful town!”
Twilight stared down at them morosely. “But you haven’t even done anything yet! And how would this even work? One of you wants eternal night and the other wants eternal day? You two can’t be working together!”
Celestia took a step forward. “Ha! That is where you are wrong, Twilight Sparkle. Sunny Skies will control the sky for twelve hours each day, while Nightmare Moon will control the night for the twelve hours that follow that!”
Twilight sighed. “So basically what Celestia and Luna did before they suddenly turned evil for no good reason?”
“Umm….” Celestia was at a loss for words.
Thankfully, Luna was not. “Stall no further, Twilight! Either we are both sent to the moon immediately, or you will become witness to the destruction of everyone around you. This will be your final warning!” One last thought came to her. “And if it would not be too much trouble, could you send a large caramel latte to the moon around nine each morning? I usually buy mine from Diamond Bucks, but—”
“Or,” Twilight interrupted coolly. “I could instead send you both to Tartarus to think about what you’ve done. Or, in this case, what you haven’t done.”
“Tartarus would never be able to hold the likes of us!” Celestia warned.
Twilight smiled at them. “I’ll take my chances. You really think I’m going to let you two skip out on work for the next thousand years?”
Celestia paused, before she timidly asked, “Will the pizzas be coming to Tartarus, too?”
***
“What did you two do?” Princess Cadence asked the pair, once they’d been escorted to their cell inside the depths of Tartarus—the same cell Cadence was currently occupying.
Instead of answering her, Luna went to the prison’s only sink and began scrubbing off her Nightmare Moon paint. Meanwhile, Celestia grabbed a brush from underneath her armor and started straightening out her mane with it.
“Pretended to have gone evil. Hoped to get sent to the moon for some vacation time,” she answered curtly.
Cadence chuckled. “I did something close to the same; although it was more of a spur of the moment thing. Shining has this horrible tendency of snatching the covers away from me and hogging the bed at night. I can’t even remember the last good sleep I’ve had.”
Celestia raised a brow. “So the Princess of Love became a tyrant?”
Cadence smiled. “Try the Princess of Rough and Questionably Consensual Love.”
“You can stop explaining there.”
“I will.” Cadence sat down on the floor in front of her. “I mean, I didn’t want to get sent to the moon or anything. I just thought a weekend of banishment somewhere alongside my favorite mattress and fresh sheets might do me some good.”
“Then why not sleep in separate beds? You and Shining?”
She shook her head. “The Princess of Love in marriage trouble? I’d rather pretend to be evil for a day.”
Coat clear of any paint, Luna stumbled toward the cell’s only bed and collapsed on top of it. “Keep talking all you want, but I, for one, am finishing with my nap. I will warn you both in advance that I tend to hog covers and kick in my sleep. There will be drool.”
Cadence closed her eyes. “I miss my bed.”
Celestia did the same and shut her eyes. “I miss my morning cheese omelet.”
That last sentence made her gasp.
“Cadence, remind me whenever we get out of here to get Sweet Berries down from the moon.”