Chapter 21: Canterlot
Celestia paced back and forth in her room, thinking of her sister. It had to be this way, she decided… letting her roam free would threaten everything she had struggled to achieve. Yet, in the back her mind, she knew she had dug herself too deep, and accumulated an insurmountable debt to the omnipotent, ever-present specter that had haunted both her and Twilight for most of their respective lives.
"What's wrong?" asked Twilight as she stepped inside.
Celestia sighed. "I guess you could say I've got a lot of skeletons in my closet."
"Don't worry, Princess, I underst"—
"No, you don't. I've been killing them, Twilight, bringing my own subjects to a dark place that the sun never touches and striking them down in their prime, and it never gets any easier." As she spoke, drips of blood began to fall from the ceiling, staining her bed sheets. "I can't wait until they're old and near death anyway, because that hardly releases any magic. I can't give them painless poisons, because in order for the magic to flow they have to leave this life suddenly, violently. I've tried stomping them and goring them and burning them alive and it's all so horrible..."
The floor became transparent, and Twilight scrambled backwards as she saw thousands of desiccated corpses piled up beneath her hooves, deeper than she could see. Their hollow sockets seemed to echo the pain and fear they'd known in their final moments, and their bodies were pale and emaciated, their coats either patchy and thin or entirely absent, their expressions pained and pleading. Twilight looked up again as her backside bumped against the wall.
"I keep them down there because I can never forgive myself, nor do I want to. What I do is horrible, and I refuse to let myself forget how many I've killed." She took a deep breath and exhaled cold, liquid death which spilled out across the floor, sinking into the tiny cracks. "It's going to end soon, though, and all because of you. After centuries of waiting, I now have a way to put a stop to all of the killing and lying."
"Me?" asked Twilight, secretly wishing the door hadn't melted into a pool of boiling blood. "What are you going to do with me?"
"It's no use telling you," sighed Celestia. "You'll never agree to it. You won't even remember it. You never remember your dreams."
The words stung. "I will this time," Twilight assured her. "I won't let you down. Just tell me, please."
Celestia smiled weakly. "It will only hurt you to know what I'm going to do. You're better off remaining ignorant right up until the final moment."
"Ignorant of what? Princess, I…"
…
Twilight gradually awoke from her too-brief slumber, experiencing a second or two of disorientation from the strange room she was in. Then, as she became fully awake, she recalled the events of the previous night just as she recognized the room as the one she'd had for years as a filly. The bed's too small for me now, she observed with a strange sadness. When she spotted Spike sleeping in his old bed, she knew right away that it wouldn't be right to wake him.
Walking down the stairs of her tower, she was surprised to see a meal prepared for her in her dining room—oatmeal, to be exact. She sniffed it cautiously before taking a small bite and waiting for some sign of ill effects. When none came after a couple minutes, she resumed eating, and pondered the strangeness of the day that lay ahead.
As she navigated Canterlot, some ponies gave her strange looks, but none spoke to her. She managed to track down Celestia as she was passing between two wings of the castle and trotted up alongside her.
"Good morning, Princess."
"Good morning to you, too, Twilight."
It seemed to her the most bizarre thing in the world that after all of her adventures, up to and including her fight against Celestia, she should be here exchanging pleasantries with her old mentor. I could almost believe it was all just a dream, she thought.
"Twilight," said Celestia after a short silence, "I'm reinforcing some of the enchantments around the castle. Would you care to help?"
"I'd be happy to."
They traveled to several key location around the castle, with Celestia teleporting them, then walking around slowly, sensing for the enchantments with her horn.
As Twilight channeled her magic into the ley-lines (which served as invisible conduits) around the castle, she noticed something odd: in addition to leading to an invisible dome over Canterlot, they also led to a central point somewhere deep inside the castle. Furthermore, the spells the princess told her to perform seemed to strengthen the ley-lines themselves, rather than the enchantments. She could make nothing definite of this realization, though, so she carried on as instructed.
"I'm worried about my friends," confessed Twilight. "I didn't warn them that I was coming here, and I don't think I could ever convince them I'm doing the right thing."
"Well," replied Celestia, "you have plenty of time to work out some sort of agreement with them. They care very deeply about you, and I'm sure they'll understand if you approach them about it the right way."
"Maybe…" said Twilight doubtfully. Then, she remembered something important. "Princess, is the war in Sustria still ongoing?"
"It's… complicated." Princess Celestia closed her eyes for a moment as she energized a ley-line. Then, she explained: "Some of the Wonderbolts don't want to stop until Sustria is completely under Equestrian control, and I suspect they may still be attacking the pigs behind my back. The rest of them argue that there has been enough bloodshed, and I agree—the entire goal of the war was to reduce communication between pigs and ponies to a minimum, and, for better or worse, we've certainly achieved this."
There was another pause as Twilight took her turn with a ley-line. Once she had finished, she looked up at Celestia and said "I think it's wonderful how you've made Equestria into a utopia. I didn't realize it before, but this really is the best way for things to be."
Celestia smiled softly at her. "I'm glad you think so, Twilight."
…
Meanwhile, Luna and the others were sneaking through rarely-used hallways of the castle, alert for the sound of hoofsteps. It was slow going, because they couldn't pass through any of the crowded parts of the castle, which meant they had to take a roundabout, winding path.
"How close are we?" whispered Pinkie.
"It depends," said Luna. "I'm not sure where Twilight is, so we'll just have to be thorough."
They entered an extremely wide, long hallway that looked as though it hadn't been used in several decades. There were cobwebs and dust everywhere, layered over a long red carpet and stone walls adorned with elaborate tapestries, along with the chandeliers that hung from the high, arched ceiling. It seemed as though the place been abandoned simply due to its inconvenient location in the castle's labyrinthine bowels.
"Maybe we should split up," suggested Applejack. "That way, we stand a better chance of findin' Twilight before Celestia can do anythin' to hurt her."
"Maybe," said Luna, "but I think all of you should stay together. I'll teleport around to look for Twilight on my own, but please, be careful."
They agreed that they would, and she blinked out of sight. Just as they began to take another step forward, however, the doors at the far end of the hallway opened.
"Hey, look! Someone was sneaking around the castle!"
In front of them, nearly a hundred feet away, stood Blizzard and Misty of the Wonderbolts.
"Stay back!" shouted Applejack. "We ain't afraid of you!"
They looked at each other for a moment, and then laughed. "I suppose you wouldn't be," Misty called out mockingly. "You do seem to have us outnumbered, don't you?"
"Wait," said Blizzard, turning towards Misty. "Aren't those the same ponies we were supposed to track down?"
Misty squinted at them. "Hey, yeah! They are! Well, isn't this convenient…"
Their cocky attitudes infuriated Rainbow Dash. "How dare you two stand there, looking so smug?" she bellowed. "Do you even care about all those pigs you killed in Sustria?"
The two of them began taking languishing steps forward. "A job's a job," shrugged Misty. "Those pigs aren't exactly saints, either, y'know. If anything, I'd say we did them a favor. Their lives have always been miserable, filthy and short—we just made them a little bit shorter."
Even as Rainbow Dash's fury threatened to master her, she rapidly analyzed the situation: on the bright side, they were indoors, so the Wonderbolts wouldn't be able to employ any weather-based attacks against them. On the downside, they still had plenty of room to fly around.
The Wonderbolts continued their measured advance—seeing that their prey wasn't about to flee, they knew there was no need to rush. Once they had closed about half of the distance, however, they leapt into the air in unison and barreled towards the ponies with terrifying speed.
Applejack and Fluttershy just barely managed to jump out of the way in time, and the Wonderbolts skidded past them. Misty was the first to turn around, and Rainbow Dash leapt through the air towards her. There was a brief tangle between them as she struggled to pin the Wonderbolt to the ground, but Misty must have been well-trained in close combat, because before Rainbow Dash could lay a hoof on her opponent she felt a winding blow smash into her side.
As she was knocked to the ground, however, Rarity and Pinkie Pie leapt towards Misty while Blizzard flew over all of them, landing on the other side where Fluttershy and Applejack were waiting. Rainbow Dash quickly struggled to her hooves again just as Misty leapt backwards to avoid getting kicked. Rainbow Dash pounced on her, however, and soon she, Pinkie Pie and Rarity had the Wonderbolt pinned. It was then that they realized they had no idea what to do with her.
Behind them, Fluttershy and Applejack still struggled against Blizzard, who repeatedly slipped out of their grasp while wearing them down with sharp jabs. "How 'bout a lil' help here?" shouted Applejack, her momentary distraction earning her a painful kick to the shin.
"You hear that?" Misty hissed, smirking at Rainbow Dash, who was the closet to her face. "Your friends can't take Blizzard by themselves. Your only option is to put me out of commission. Go on, let's see you do it."
Rainbow Dash's mind was racing furiously—she knew she had to act fast, or else she and her friends would face whatever fate the Wonderbolts had in store for them. Knowing there was no time to waste, she shouted "Break her wings!"
The smile vanished from Misty's face. "You can't be seri—ARGH!"
She roared in pain as Rainbow Dash stamped down hard on her wing joint. Rarity and Pinkie Pie watched in shock, jaws agape, almost losing their grip on the thrashing Wonderbolt.
"Come on!" snarled Rainbow Dash through gritted teeth. "We have to do something! It's them or us!"
Both of them were too confused to fully assess the situation, so they simply followed their friend's example and started pummeling Misty's wings, causing her to scream even louder.
Blizzard glanced over at his cohort with alarm, but there was no time to rush to her aid—Applejack and Fluttershy were still furiously lunging at her, so she leapt into the air and flew up, out of their reach.
Without taking their eyes off her, they ran over to Misty, who was now letting out strained laughter, interspersed with choking sobs.
"You've got a stronger will than I thought, kid," she said to Rainbow Dash. "Not many ponies your age are so decisive."
Rainbow narrowed her eyes in disgust. "Alright," she barked to the others authoritatively, "now let's get Blizzard."
As they leapt away from Misty, she immediately tried to stand up, but found that her shattered wings made it nearly impossible to balance without experiencing excruciating pain. "Blizzard!" she shouted urgently. "Whatever you do, don't let them catch you! Stall for time!"
He complied, staying near the ceiling where he was well out of their reach. Rainbow Dash narrowed her eyes at him. She spent a couple seconds wondering why the Wonderbolts wanted to stall for time before approaching hoofsteps from behind answered her question.
It seemed that sizable portion of the flying team must have been patrolling the castle, because two more Wonderbolts had now arrived: Blast and Tyco.
"Thank Celestia!" cried Misty. "How about lending a hoof?"
The two newcomers didn't waste a second. In one fluid motion, they took off and flew up alongside Blizzard before the three Wonderbolts all swooped down towards Rainbow Dash.
She tried to dodge, but they cut her off and lifted her into the air before her friends could help. As they carried the struggling pegasus pony back down the hallway, the other four galloped after them, but the Wonderbolts were through the door before they had even made it halfway. They took one last backwards glance at the limping Misty before charging onward, intent on saving their friend.
…
At that very moment, Twilight and Celestia were just finishing their work on the enchantments. Celestia seemed for a moment to be looking over at something in some nearby gardens, but just as Twilight tried to follow her gaze she looked away again.
"That's the last one," announced the princess. "Twilight, you've been very helpful today. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have royal business to attend to. You should find lunch waiting for you in your tower."
Twilight was surprised that it could be lunchtime already, but she bid Celestia farewell and teleported away.
In the shadows of the nearby garden, a magically concealed Luna frantically racked her brain trying to remember exactly where Twilight's tower was located. Her thinking was interrupted, however, as her sister appeared in front of her in a flash of light.
"Luna, Luna," she chided. "You should really have known better. I would have recognized your shadow-crawling anywhere."
Princess Luna was terrified, but she was determined not to show it. She revealed herself, stepping out into the sunlight with a look of contempt on her face. "You know what?" she asked. "I've obviously been a thorn in your side for far too long now. Why don't you just kill me and be done with it?"
"I could never kill my own sister," Celestia said softly.
"Oh, so hundreds of your subjects are just fine to kill, but not your own flesh and blood, is that it? I thought you did whatever you had to for the 'greater good,' as you like to call it."
"All I have to do," said Celestia slowly and evenly, "is send you away for a little while." Seeing a look of horror cross Luna's features, she added "And I do mean a little while. This won't be the thousand-year affair of before—twenty-four hours is all I need. Then, you won't have to worry about fighting me ever again."
Celestia had begun charging her spell while she was speaking, and before Luna could react, she was struck with the beam that would send her, once again, to the moon.
Now alone in the garden, Celestia took a deep breath and looked upwards at the clear blue sky. Everything was coming together.