A stallion found himself watching the sunset.
He was standing on a balcony on one of the residential towers in Canterlot; the Princess had given him a room there while he recovered from his ordeal, to give him some distance from prying eyes and ears while staying within the confines of the castle. He wasn’t confined to the room, and on occasion the Princess or her sister or her niece or some other pony came to visit and talk. He enjoyed the visits from her niece the most; the last time she’d visited she’d let him listen to her belly, and her baby had kicked him in the ear hard enough to send him sprawling on the floor. They’d both started laughing at that.
Then a little while later she’d told him it was a filly. He’d started crying at that.
He heard, rather than felt, somepony teleport into his room. He didn’t bother turning around.
“I was expecting you earlier.” he said.
“I apologize, Shining.” the ruler of Equestria replied. “I… found myself forced to attend to other matters.”
The stallion simply shrugged. After several seconds of silence, the other pony - if she could be called that - stepped out beside him.
“Do… do you know what happened?”
The stallion nodded. “The root of her horn had grown, rapidly enough to tear through her magic membrane. The pressure and radiation hitting her frontal lobe would have done enough damage to cause poor judgement, mood instability, amorality, severe shifts in personality and temperament…”
“Everything and more to turn her into Dawn.” the ruler of Equestria said.
“Or push her in that direction, at least. She was never the most stable of ponies, and I can’t imagine that she’d ever react well to those revelations; she might not have gone Dawn’s route, but there still would have been… problems.”
“Admittedly so. Have they found a cause for her initial condition? The inflammation of the root of her horn?”
“…they think it might have been a complication from her becoming a unicorn again.”
“…I see.”
There was silence for a time. Eventually the ruler of Equestria spoke again.
“It’s beautiful. I had forgotten what it truly looked like after all these years.”
The stallion didn’t immediately respond, instead glancing down towards the main courtyard of the castle. A grin formed on his face as he saw who was entering it.
“You might want to cast your eyes a little bit lower.”
She gave him an odd look for a moment before following his gaze. She watched as five ponies and a small dragon travelled up to the centre of the courtyard, each showing clear signs of excitement and agitation. Her brow furrowed in confusion.
“What are they-”
“Just watch.” the stallion interrupted.
She watched as the castle doors opened, and an alicorn and a guardspony stepped out. These two also walked to the courtyard’s centre, stopping only a short distance away from the first group. They stood facing each other for some time, holding a conversation that neither pony on the balcony could hear. The first group grew visibly more agitated, and started walking up to the doors, the two newcomers following a short distance behind them. The ruler of Equestria glanced at the stallion once more, her wings shifting anxiously.
“Shining-“
Then the doors opened. Two alicorns slowly emerged, taking small steps to keep pace with the uncertain stride of the pony between them.
A purple unicorn mare, with a single wing folded at her side.
The ruler of Equestria stopped breathing.
“The local Shining Armor put a barrier around her root at the size it was supposed to be. The doctors found the swelling and the damage when they were making sure he hadn’t done anything else to her; they removed the excess and healed the membrane, and all of a sudden she was a lot more rational when she woke up.” He glanced at the mare frozen beside him, watching as her eyes started to shimmer. “She has some motor function damage, a bit of memory loss, and she’s never going to be able to do magic quite the same way that she could...”
The group in the yard had frozen, and the unicorn stepped out from between the alicorns, her stride growing longer and more confident as she got closer to them. Then they too surged forwards, meeting the mare with an enthusiastic cry that easily carried up to the two observers.
“TWILIGHT!”
“…but she’s alive, sis.” The stallion broke into a smug grin as the tears began to flow down his sister’s face. She turned to him, fear and relief warring in her eyes.
“D-did it work? Is the timeline-“
“We don’t know for sure. Pip’s still looking for the traverser; she’s a little tricky to find, given how little we know of her, but I’m sure he’ll be able to track her down.” The stallion popped his tongue, her eye sliding over to meet hers directly. “But Dawn isn’t going to rise. Celestia isn’t going to die. I’m pretty damned sure we did it.”
“Oh, thank Faust… I’ll be the last…” The stallion’s sister gave into her sobs, letting her tears flow freely for the first time in nearly a decade. He watched in silence, suppressing the urge to wrap a leg around her and provide what little comfort he could to the mare. He wouldn’t be able to touch her in any case; intangibility was an unfortunate side effect of the translinear projection used to observe timelines. Her cries ceased eventually, and when her eyes returned to her they held a calm resolution.
“When’s the execution date?” the stallion asked. His sister took a breath.
“Tomorrow. They intend to hang me from the highest tower, such that the whole of Canterlot can watch me struggle, then dismember my corpse and carry a piece to every city, town, and village in Equestria.”
The stallion flicked his ear at the tone in her voice. “…but you don’t intend to let them to do so.”
The mare nodded once.
“I have given up many things in these last few months. Most of them did not rightfully belong to me. Some of them did, and I accepted their loss as my punishment.” She took a breath. “But my life? I think I’ll be a little selfish and keep that for myself.”
Her horn glowed, and a line of magic appeared around her neck. She closed her eyes for several seconds, then opened them again, giving him one last look-
“Goodbye, Big Brother, Best Friend Forever.”
-and then she was gone.
The stallion’s eye roamed the empty space beside him for a few moments before he turned it back down to the courtyard. His gaze falling upon the mare sitting on the grass below, surrounded by her friends and family. Smiling, laughing, and alive.
“Goodbye. Twily.”