150. HEADCANON MASH-UP
Chapter 150 Special
by Everyone
***
Pearple Prose/Fuzzyfurvert
Continuation of Civilisation/Flower(2)
It was cold in the pass between the peaks of the Spindle mountain range. The sun had hidden behind a stray cloud, and although the two travelers were protected from the wind by the rock that encroached on them from both sides, the temperature had dropped to just above freezing and stayed there.
Twilight Sparkle shivered, a tremor traveling down her spine and making her wings flex briefly. The white alicorn by her side smiled at her, offering her a place beneath her huge downy wing, an offer which Twilight took after a brief hesitation.
“It’s pretty lonely in here, isn’t it?” Twilight said. The sound of her voice echoed down the pass.
Celestia hummed. “Tis so. I don’t think anypony has walked through here in decades. Centuries, even.” She eyed their surroundings with something akin to disappointment. “Not even weeds seem to grow here.”
“I don’t like it.” Twilight shivered again, and it wasn’t due to the cold this time. “It’s too quiet. Reminds me of that time when my friends and I were climbing that mountain, you know, to stop that dragon. There was an avalanche – Wasn’t pretty.”
Celestia giggled. “I’m sure.”
There was a lull in the conversation, before Twilight spoke up again. “What’s even on the other side of these mountains, anyway?”
Celestia looked at her oddly. “I thought you knew your geography?”
Twilight looked offended. “Hey, that’s not my fault! I just kinda…” She sighed. “Well, let’s just say I’ve been cooped up in Canterlot for a loooong time now. You can forgive an old mare for being forgetful sometimes, right?”
“Fair,” Celestia conceded. “The other side of the Spindels should, unless I’m very much mistaken, lead to the Old World.”
“The Old World?” Twilight asked. Then she gasped. “Wait, as in the Great Exodus? Hearth’s Warming Eve? That Old World?”
Celestia smiled, and nodded. “There are secrets buried there – Secrets that I and my sister have been unable to uncover for millennia.”
“Interesting.” Twilight stroked her chin with a hoof. “Where is Luna, anyway?”
Celestia shrugged. “Around.” And that was all.
The two walked in peace for a time. The valley was silent save for the echoes of their hooves as they clacked against the stone. Gradually, the temperature got colder and colder, and the whistling of the wind grew more pronounced as they neared the end of the passage.
Something caught Celestia’s eye. She stifled a gasp, but it was too late – Twilight turned her head and saw it too.
“Is…” Twilight frowned. “Is that a flower?”
In a small crag where dirt, blown by the near constant wind in the pass, had collected, a tiny flower with star shaped petals bloomed in defiance of the barren landscape around it. It was the only spot of color amid the dark grey stones save for the two of them. The wind shifted as they stared at the flower, bringing its strange scent to them.
“That brings back memories.” Celestia’s voice, quiet as it was, echoed. “The σούρουπο. I haven’t seen it since that day in the garden.”
Twilight narrowed her eyes as she stared. She remained silent for a time and then stepped over to the bright flower. Up close, the scent was overpowering. It made her nose itch and her eyes burn. “I seem to recall that you lied to me that day. Maybe you didn’t actually tell me a lie, but you let me come to a false conclusion. If we’re going to do this...this thing, ‘us’ again, then you have to promise me that we aren’t going to walk down that road again. Honesty has to be our policy with each other.”
Twilight sighed and looked back over her shoulder. “Can you even do that anymore? Can you drop the whole chessmaster schtick?”
Celestia tilted her head, her eyes focused on the flower that shared the same shade as her eyes. “You wore that title even better than I did in my prime, Twilight. We are embarking on something new together. I think you would well know by now that I can’t see the future anymore than anypony else. I can promise you honesty, if you can promise it back to me.”
Twilight kept her stare even for a long moment. “I promise.”
She turned back to the flower and frowned. “The Will of the Everfree, hmm? I suppose you’re blooming here in this pony-forsaken crag because we’ve decided to give up the rulership of our ponies? You’ve been in the background my entire life. You are the source of so much strife and so much life. You’ve resented your slavery to ponykind since the beginning.”
Twilight leaned closer to the flower, her eyes watering and her nose wrinkling from the smell. She didn’t care that she probably looked like some old crazy mare, talking to a flower. She didn’t care that her words would likely mean nothing to the flower or the entity it represented. She didn’t care that it was freezing or that the wind was being enterprising in finding its way under her heavy robes. All she cared about, at that moment, was spitting out what she had to say.
“Keep on resenting it. Suffer in your service to the ponies that shepard Equestria. They’ll go about it in a far better fashion than you ever did. The only reason this flower is even here is to laugh at us, the last Princesses of ponydom. You might have thought that you won. That we concede. We don’t. Ponies will continue to guide Equestria, even if the Princesses don’t guide them.
“So you can take this as my resignation and shove it up whatever you have for an ass.” Twilight growled out the last and ducked her head to chomp her teeth around the flower and yank it out by the root. She meant to eat it, but the taste was too much for her. She settled, instead, on chewing a few times before spitting the mangled plant onto the cold stone of the mountain pass.
“Feel better?”
Twilight gagged and shook her head. “I hope there is a stream or something soon. That tasted terrible!”
Celestia grinned. “I’m sure the Everfree will think twice from now on before it sprouts flowers around you.”
Finally – eventually – Twilight and Celestia stepped out from the pass and into the open. Snow was falling now, dainty little drops of white that covered the smooth rock around them. In the distance, Twilight could see a vast field of whiteness, with enormous stormy clouds hovering ominously on the horizon.
“So.” Celestia raised her voice over the whistling of the gales around them. “This is it.”
Twilight drew her eyes from the horizon, and gasped.
Before them, a row of enormous statues stood defiantly. They were impossible in scale – Twilight wasn’t sure how they could have even been carved without excessive amounts of magic, and yet on closer inspection, they were vividly detailed. The fierce climate had taken its toll, but they still clearly depicted a set of six ponies, two of each tribe.
“Amazing,” Twilight breathed.
“I didn’t even know something like this existed,” Celestia said, still staring in awe. “Who made them, I wonder?”
Before the words had even left her mouth, Twilight was stomping off through the snow towards them.
“Twilight, wait!” Celestia cried out, chasing after her. “They could be dangerous!”
Twilight looked back, and smiled. “We won’t know if we don’t check them out!” She giggled gleefully, bouncing through the snow like a filly. “And besides! Just look at these! They’re incredible!”
The wind stopped. A voice boomed through the mountains. “Heed mine Sister’s warning, Twilight Sparkle.”
Twilight gasped, and turned. There, touching down upon the snow with a dancer’s grace, was Princess Luna.
And then a big white alicorn appeared behind her and said, “Hey, look, it’s Lulu!” before proceeding to put her in a headlock and give her a sisterly nuggie.
“H-Hey!” Luna squirmed in her sister’s grasp. “Stop that!”
Celestia acquiesced, allowing Luna to regain her composure before prodding her on the nose. “Boop.”
“Tiaaaa!” Luna whined. “You’re ruining it!”
The two stopped, and turned to see a purple alicorn rolling around in the snow, laughing herself to tears.
“It’s not that funny…” Luna huffed.
Twilight wiped away a tear and climbed to her hooves. The three alicorns smiled at each other, before Luna regained her stern frown. “As enjoyable as this reunion is, we still have a long way to go.” She gestured to the grand statues. “There is old magic here – Older, even, than my sister and I. These statues, they are the gates to the Old World, although I do confess that I have no idea how to open them."
Twilight nodded. “Alright.” Then she smiled. “Let’s get to it, then.”
Luna quirked an eyebrow. “You seem… lively.”
Twilight shrugged. “I’ve let off a little steam.”
Celestia just smiled.
=====================================================================
Misago/Knight of Cerebus
Baggage/Garden
Twilight closed her eyes, her mind slowly entering her happy place. Ponies blinked at the sight of their Princess miming what looked to be a classic box pose, but was in fact her shelving phantom books in her library. The sound of beeps came from all around her. Somepony next to her was humming a jaunty, panicky tune. A nurse attempted to break her out of the trance after she clocked a passing doctor when reaching for an especially high book case, but she was promptly stopped by the other, more savvy servants and guards in the waiting chamber.
Ponies ran to and fro through the room, charts, pillows and magical restraints in their grasp. The restraints had been Twilight’s idea. The thought of her lover levelling the castle in her state of extreme pain had not been a comforting one for her.
History of the Equestrian Tax System, Economics section. Dream Destiny of a Bed of Roses, Prose section. A Beginner's Guide to the Lemegeton? Why was that out here? Had Spike once again put books from the archives out where the public could see them? Why, Twilight had half a mind to go to him right now and...
"Princess?"
Twilight blinked. “Huh?” She looked around, her eyes taking in the castle, and immediately her heart dropped into her stomach. She had been shelving. She only started shelving when something really, really, worse-than-a-B-grade bad was happening. Something like…
“Her Majesty is asking for you.”
Twilight’s eyes widened in a bought of horror, taking in the medical wing of the castle and what looked to be some of the more famous doctors from across the country. “When did she start…?”
“We brought you as soon as we heard. We’ve just finished preparations for visitors now. We were trying to reach you, but, uh, Captain Armor assured us it was best to leave you until absolutely necessary.”
Twilight blushed, looking down and fidgeting her hooves. “Thanks…” She squeaked, standing up and trotting towards the foreboding set of double doors. On the other side of that barrier was the greatest pony in the world, battling with death itself to bring a new--their--new life into being. “No pressure.” She said with a whisper lifted from Fluttershy’s vocalizations.
Her legs were heavy when she arrived. Thoughtlessly, she reached out with a hoof, staring dumbly at it, trying to decipher the mystery of the door handle.
Was she really ready for this? Ready to be a parent? To guide a little pony from her earliest moments on, nurture her and protect her? Could she handle that responsibility? She shook her head, clearing the thoughts as they came. Worse was the notion that the baby wouldn’t even make it to the stage of “earliest moments.” Had she done enough? Would one extra pillow really make the difference between a safe birth and a stillborn? Maybe the ultrasound had been a false positive. Maybe the foal would come out malformed. What would she do then? She shuddered at the thought.
She felt cold. The sound around her died down. The whispered conversations, the frantic activity. All white noise. There was only her and the door, the door separating her from…
“Is Twilight out there, doctor?” The voice that was echoing through the door was weary, battered.
The princess. Celestia. Her wife. The pony that meant more to her than anything else in the world.
Twilight didn’t hesitate. With a flash of purple light, she appeared in the centre of the room.
“Princess! I’m sorry, I came as soon as they said I could, I--” Celestia looked exhausted, bags under her eyes and her mane trailing in loose filaments where it had been pushed out of place. Her cheeks were wet with tears, her body was draped limply against the bed and the muscles of her face were sagging under the strain of constant contortions. Despite all this, she still smiled warmly at Twilight.
“Why didn’t you let me in sooner?” Twilight half pleaded, half demanded.
“Anything that might have stressed her could have led to her starting to go into convulsions before we were ready. We still need to run some fina--”
Celestia gave a cry, her gigantic, usually dignified body arching against the contractions of her uterus. Hormones that her body hadn’t flooded her with since before the construction of the Castle Of The Royal Sisters now erupted across her body, telling it to push with all of its might.
Twilight ran down the facts of pony birth. Earth ponies were, as far as she had been told, typically birthed quite quickly and with very little effort. The fact that the birth was causing Celestia trouble meant that their foal had gotten some of their unicorn or pegasus portions, which both excited and terrified her. Hope shot through her, visions of her and a little magician practicing magic together bringing tears to her eyes. She made her way to Celestia in a flash, intertwining their hooves the way her father had said he had done for her mother.
Celestia looked at her gratefully, though her face looked nothing like the gentle mask of patience many had seen during court sessions. This one was for her alone amongst several millenia of others that had been in her lover’s life. The hoof she had grabbed curled around her’s tightly, Celestia’s eyes closing in a look of peace and anticipation. The moment hung between the two, delicate as glass and pure as silver, with a pause that dulled the hollering doctors, beeping machines and scrambling nurses to a pleasant hum.
It was abruptly cut off by another expression of agony, Celestia’s body shaking against the outline of the creature pressing itself against the edge of her cervical canal. She managed to scream at the sensation of sharp, bony tips of limbs and head cutting against tender flesh, her back end flexing and contorting with the child trapped within it. Where the broken arm she had suffered during the Lunar Rebellion had been like shards of glass entering her elbow joint, this was more like scimitars slashing their way through her entire pelvis. Her hoof constricted against Twilight’s arm, crushing it in a grip that was fueled by spasming nerves long since surrendered from her conscious control.
Fluids rushed from Celestia down the bed and across its covers, their life giving functions no longer required by her body. The doctors, of course, seemed to find all of this perfectly normal, but it was the most terrifying moment of Twilight’s life. She had never seen any living thing in as much pain as Celestia was in at that moment, and it was heartbreaking and horrifying to her in every way. Spasms rocked through Celestia’s body, her muscles twitching uselessly, her body pushing as it had never done so before
Guilt fought with blind, animal panic for control of Twilight’s body, with the desire to jump between her writhing lover and the doctors becoming stronger with every moment. But reason and compassion won in the end, as they always seemed to in a proper crisis. Her hoof held firmly against Celestia’s, allowing her overworked nerves and muscles to vent into it. In that moment Twilight could feel an iota of Celestia’s pain by the force with which she squeezed. Her other hoof found its way to Celestia’s chest resting lightly on it, reminding her that she was there for her. Celestia seemed to take strength from this, pressing through the battle between birth canals and baby with a newfound forcefulness.
After what felt like an eon, but the doctors casually informed her was a perfectly healthy four minutes, a bundle of flesh poked out from between Celestia’s spread legs. Twilight was able to identify a head, covered in fluids but a set of vivid colours nonetheless. Celestia seemed to sag as it came out, stealing air with massive, desperate, greedy gasps. There was a pause, which Twilight was uncertain of the meaning of, but the fact that Celestia was still breathing was enough for her in the whirlwind of terror this moment had thus far been. Celestia body trembled, and all at once the rest of the foal came rushing out, the body propelled easily along the rest of Celestia’s birthing chamber now that the awkward head and torso had managed to fit through her insides.
And then it was over. With a final outcry, Celestia collapsed, breathing heavily, against Twilight’s neck. When she felt her wife's pain subside, Twilight felt herself relax. She continued stroking her hooves through Celestia's mane, whispering soothing words of love all the way. What this wonderful pony had gone through for her, she could probably never repay. She resolved to herself that, if ever there was a next time, she would be the one to carry the child.
But the sound of crying ripped her from her trance, and she turned around. There, floating in an unfamiliar magic aura, was a dark blue bundle of fur, red and orange streaks of mane swaddling the head. The eyes were shut against the light that had just entered the child’s world, and it was trembling and crying against the cold, dry sensation of air. She felt a wave of protectiveness wash over her, and with it a surge of strength her horn lit up. She enveloped the crying foal in her telekinesis, extinguishing the doctor's in the process, and finally, after what felt like an eternity, floated it over to her.
Twilight felt Celestia softly gasp, and a heartbeat later, the much more welcome golden glow joined her own, tracing over the foal, cleaning and drying it, and at the same time searching for any wounds or blemishes, anything that could cause the little one pain. Only when Celestia's magic receded did Twilight allow herself to breath again.
It was done. The little filly was there. And as she finally reached a hoof out to touch her foal for the first time, she felt joy like she had never felt before. The dark blue coat was not smooth to the touch. It did not feel like silk, or velvet, or any other substance praised for its softness. Despite the cleaning, it was damp, it stuck together in little clumps, and yet it was the most wonderful thing Twilight had ever laid her hooves on.
The moment she made contact, the foal stopped crying. The little head, tufts of mane still sticking from it at rather awkward angles, tried to move, straining muscles that had never been strained like that before. Little forehooves waved about. Weeks from now, they would be carrying the filly on her first steps, but now, they instinctively grabbed for her mothers, before she could even fully understand what those mothers were to her. A cough, halfway to the first attempt at vocalisation, then a mewling sound. It shook Twilight from her rapture, and without ever disconnecting her hoof from her foal, she gently guided it over to Celestia.
---／人◕ ‿‿ ◕人＼---
It felt unreal, even more so through the veil of tears. As Celestia watch the tiny filly float closer, she could not help but wonder if she would wake up. Only the feeling of Twilight’s foreleg around her shoulder, supporting her, drawing her closer, told her that it was real enough.
The crying had been pure horror for her. Even after magically reassuring herself that the foal was alright, that she was not harmed, even with the knowledge that those noises were a good sign, that the foal’s lungs worked, she had felt each reverberate through her body. She needed to help her daughter, had to protect her from whatever made her cry and keep her safe. Suddenly, these months spent under Twilight’s overbearing nature seemed not so unreasonable to her.
At the time she had been annoyed, sometimes even irritated when Twilight had seen fit to plan her routes through the palace garden or dispatch a platoon of guards whenever she left her room. But now it was not her body she saw being dashed against a cobblestone street when she tripped, but her daughter’s, pressed under the weight of Celestia’s own. Now she saw that it was not her who Twilight feared would have been hurt in the midst of an abrupt attack, or poisoned by badly prepared food, or a thousand other dangers of the chaotic world of the living, but this precious creature in front of her--her daughter.
Carefully, she lowered her head to take a look at her--their-- daughter floating in front of her, marveling at the ease with which Twilight had stopped the filly’s tears. Twilight, who had worried so much, even after helping with Spike, that she would not be a good mother. That she would be too awkward in her care, somehow could not show her love sufficiently.
But when she and the filly both nuzzled into Celestia, she knew everything was going to be fine.
She felt a tiny hoof weakly batting at her, turning her head to look into curious indigo eyes. She felt Twilight pressing into her. She felt her body relax, the exhaustion of the day finally catching up with her. With her daughter cradled carefully but firmly in her hooves, and her wife at her side, she slowly closed her eyes, and within seconds, she had drifted off in the land of dreams.
---／人◕ ‿‿ ◕人＼---
“It’s a girl.” The doctor said to Twilight, who simply nodded at him dumbly.
“We had a magic scan already.” She managed to lamely offer. She ran her hooves across the form, instinct telling her to lick down the baby’s fur, which the foal responded to with occasional whines and calls.
“Have you given any thought to what you’re going to name her?” The doctor said, floating a birth certificate towards her meaningfully. Twilight blinked.
"Huh? Oh, yes. We’re calling her Starburst.” Almost as an afterthought, she added, with a loving look to Celestia, then to the filly, “Since she came from the meeting of a pair of stars."
"Alright then," The doctor said, scrawling some quick notes on his clipboard
"Congratulations, your Majesties, your daughter is as healthy as we could have wished for. You can probably take her to your quarters in a day or two.”
Twilight gave the doctor a grateful, if a little tired, smile as he left, and turned her attention back to the bed, where Celestia and the foal were now peacefully sleeping. They were mothers now. Mothers, with a tiny unicorn daughter.
Twilight kissed the sleeping foal softly on its head.
“Sleep well, Starburst”, she cooed softly. “Tomorrow is your first day out there in the real world, and we’re going to do our best to share it with you.”
=====================================================================
ArguingPizza/Grimman007
Moderately/Parents
Swollen white hooves tapped impatiently against the marble pavestones of Princess Celestia’s private balcony.
“You’d think for the incarnation of time itself he’d be able to arrive on schedule,” she grumbled to herself. Celestia allowed herself to pout, as she was, for once, alone. Her private balcony was shielded from view by design of the Palace itself, and the Royal Guard had issued an order that grounded all Pegasi within 500 meters of the castle grounds. Nopony, on hoof or in flight, could see her.
More importantly, nopony could see the swirling vortex of light that formed as space and time was ripped asunder. Every color of visible light, and a few that weren’t, shrouded the Sun Princess as a pair of figures slowly manifested from the whirlpool of Creation.
“Fiiinally,” she groused. Celestia knew she was being less than Princessly, but between her alicorn-sized dose of insane hormones and the foal that seemed to be doing its damnedest to smash her internal organs to pieces, she couldn’t find it in her to care. It had been a rough eleven and a half months.
“You know your father, sweetheart,” the smaller figure sighed as the light faded and she stepped forward to envelop her daughter in a hug. The smell of rain and wildflowers filled her nose as she leaned into her mother, one of the few beings actually taller than her.
“I’M THE MASTER OF TIME ITSELF. IF I SAY WE’RE NOT LATE, WE’RE NOT LATE.” Celestia and her mother both gave Father Time a flat look. After only a few seconds, he wilted. “SORRY, HONEY.”
Mother Earth smiled in amusement, and Celestia couldn’t help but let a filly-ish giggle escape. Her mother turned her attention back to her daughter and, especially, her bulging stomach.
“You’re glowing, my angel. Pregnancy suits you.” Celestia blushed and raised a hoof to her belly. Another round of fierce kicks met her, and her motherly smile turned to a grimace.
“It may suit me, but I am certainly looking forward to it being over with. I swear this one isn’t happy until I’m miserable, sometimes.”
A sound like wind chimes filled the air as Mother Earth laughed. She nodded sagely, a spark of recognition and sympathy in her eyes. Pregnancy, in all its wonder and misery, was something she was well acquainted with.
“AND WHERE IS LUNA? FOR THAT MATTER, WHERE IS YOUR LITTLE WIFE? I HAVEN’T SEEN HER SINCE SHE GOT THE WINGS.” her father boomed. Whereas Mother Earth was the gentle caress of the sea, both irresistible and tender, Father Time was the overwhelming pounding of the hurricane.
“Luna is preparing the soundproofing spells required for when I pop. We wouldn’t want to deafen half the city, after all.” Though rare, birth among those connected to the Foundations of Existence were notoriously loud. Dim memories of Luna’s birth, and the panicked flocks of deaf dragons fleeing the terrible screams that announced it, still lingered in Celestia’s psyche.
“As for Twilight, well…” Almost as if on cue, a pillar of fire taller than any of Canterlot’s towers erupted from near the Palace Kitchens.
“WAS I UNCLEAR WHEN I COMMANDED YOU TO PURGE THE PALACE GROUNDS OF ALMONDS? CELESTIA IS ALLERGIC TO ALMONDS YOU EMPTY-HEADED EXCUSE FOR A CHEF! BE GONE FROM MY SIGHT, AND SET HOOF NO MORE IN CANTERLOT LEST YOU FACE THE TRUE WRATH OF MAGIC MADE FLESH!”
A beat of silence passed on the balcony. Celestia laughed nervously, unsure of how to assure her parents that her wife wasn’t really threatening to exterminate the cook from existence, and that she was just being a bit overprotective. Her father beat her to the punch, saving her the need.
“I LIKE HER.”
If you had asked Doctor Princess Twilight Everfree Sparkle, Magic Incarnate, Esq. how her day had been, she would have replied “bad”. In between running the government nigh single-hoofedly, handling the impending media circus, and more, she was now supposed to prepare for the arrival of her in-laws, who would most likely arrive within the hour. The same goddess damned hour they informed her they were coming. On top of that, she had been running full steam for forty-eight hours, and more importantly, without coffee, tea, or any sort of caffeine.
So, yes, your Princess was having a very bad day, and she would appreciate it if you would stop your Time damned chattering and either get to work or get her a coffee, and since all the sources of that mystical brew were m-a-a-a-agically and suddenly removed from a hundred mile radius, you’d better get to work or so help me I’ll send you to a hell so bad the Primordial Evils still have nightmares about it!
Twilight looked behind herself to see that the Stained Hall was now the perfect place to practice your glassblowing skills, what with all the molten puddles littering the sides.
Twilight sighed, as her internal Buck-o-meter bottomed out. “Buck it, I’m going home.”
The doors to Celestia’s room creaked open, and a disheveled purple pony princess stumbled through the door, eyes drooping and head hung tiredly. As if it was choreographed, the moment the door closed, Twilight collapsed, her body almost completely shutting down into sleep mode.
“You really know how to pick them, don’t you, Celestia?”, Mother Earth chuckled from her seat on the couch.
“Apparently I do, seeing as we’re still going strong ten years after our nupitals, ‘Miss World-Breaker’.” Celestia softly snarked back, as she levitated her wife towards the bedroom.
“My, my. And here I thought you had settled down after all these years.”
“Oh shush, you.”, Celestia whispered back, quietly closing the door to the bedroom.
“Are you getting your practice for foal raising in by caring for her, dear?”
“She is still a foal in many ways, yes, but she is an adult in far more.”
A companionable silence filled the air, until Celestia broke it with a sigh.
“I had hoped by removing caffeine from the vicinity of the city that she would eventually get some rest on her own. But… I guess I never considered that she might actually ignore her body to such a point where she would faint from lack of sleep.”
“I should have seen it coming, though. I saw her almost annihilate a loose stone because I almost tripped on it. She hypnotised an entire town because she was afraid of missing an assignment. She’s faced down monsters that could have snuffed her life out with nary a thought because I asked her to.” Celestia huffed. “I should have just asked her. Seems my scheming ways have finally bit me in the ass, huh?”
“She’s been coiled like a spring ever since I started showing, and I fear that, sooner or later, she’ll snap, and bring the world down with her. And though I, Luna, Cadance, and her friends and family have all have tried to assure her that things will be alright, she is still terrified that something will go wrong.”
“I love her to death and beyond, but I just don’t know what to do...”
“Your father was much the same before you were born. Do you know he actually tried to put me in stasis so that nothing would happen to me? Of course I slapped him until he realized that that was a terrible idea, but he was still terrified that something would happen to me.”
“Eventually I got through to him by telling him his stressing was all for naught, seeing as I was (and still am) the incarnation of the very planet we lived on, trying to hurt me would be like trying to touch emotions: impossible. Perhaps if you tried just using logic, she would be more receptive to the idea? She seems like a very logical mare to me.”
“That… just might work.” Celestia smiled.
“And that’s how the Prissy Purple Pony Princess was defeated!” Pinkie pie exclaimed.
Princess Starburst giggled with glee, as her purple pregnant mother leveled an unamused stare at her old friend.
“How did you even learn about that, Pinkie? You weren’t even in the castle at the time!”
“I was right!?” Pinkie gasped.
Twilight facehoofed.
=====================================================================
SPark/Honey Mead
Workaholic/Pinkamena(Unposted prompt, but sitting in the thread waiting on it's moment to shine!)
Luna waited on her balcony, the glow of her horn casting stark shadows across her strained expression. Her eyes never left the sky and the vibrant colors playing across it in the pre-dawn twilight. The Moon kissed the horizon, appearing for all the world to rest atop the Unicorn Range. It hadn’t moved in the past twenty seconds. She guessed she had another five.
The sharp crack of teleportation and blast of heat announced her sister’s arrival.
“I was off by two seconds.”
“What do you think you are doing, Luna?”
Luna was almost disappointed at the calmness of her sister’s tone, not that it could have given away anymore than the inferno rolling off her back. The oppressive weight of the Moon lifted from Luna’s withers as she let her magic dissipate, the celestial orb snapping back into its natural track and allowing the Sun to finally pierce the horizon.
“After being rebuffed for the third time,” Luna said as she turned, “I felt this was the only way to get your… attention.” She paused. “Tia, you look terrible.”
Despite the heat and ire rolling off her in waves, Celestia seemed unsteady, hooves placed just a little too wide apart. Dark, heavy bags hung from her tired, bloodshot eyes. Her mane and tail, once free flowing cascades, drooped to the floor, as lively as sap at mid-winter.
Celestia snorted with derision, though even that came out tired and drawn. “I trust you do not defy the order of the heavens simply to comment on my appearance.”
Luna shook her head and prepared herself for what was to come. “I was waiting for you to find the forms, but it has been weeks, and I have things I would like to do.” Lighting her horn again, Luna removed her tiara and placed it on the banister. “I abdicated, official,” she glanced back at the Sun, “ten seconds ago.”
Celestia closed her eyes. A second ticked by in silence, then two. Then she opened them to reveal two orbs of roiling magma. The tired mare was gone, burnt away like kindling tossed into a volcano, and only the Sun Goddess remained. She stepped forward, wings spread to their full glory. “You what!”
Luna took an unconscious, uncertain step back before she could rally. Shifting her weight slightly, she took a more solid defensive stance, determined to stay her ground. “I’m sorry, Tia—”
“Sorry?” Celestia nearly spat, furry twisting her voice into a dry desert gale. “There is nothing to be sorry about. You cannot leave. Our ponies need us. I won’t allow it!”
Luna matched her sister’s fiery glare with her own sub-zero glower. Frost clung to the stones about her hooves, creeping closer to the solar diarch only to flash into steam. “Yes,” she said, with the cold, finality of the void. “I am. Twilight was—”
A crack of thunder drowned out Luna’s words. Celestia’s hoof stuck like a meteor into the balcony. The stone shattered, fissures spidering to the edges. In the blink of an eye centuries old marble crumbled from beneath their hooves, forcing both to take wing as the whole of it sloughed off the tower, tumbling to the palace grounds below.
Luna beat her wings, circling and rising from the shattered balcony. Celestia followed, the pair spiraling around each other, ice and fire trailing behind. “How dare you bring Twilight into this!” she shouted.
Something in Luna snapped. “How dare I? How dare you treat her like you did! She was willing to give you everything, and you were willing to give her almost nothing! How dare I?”
“You-”
Luna didn’t give Celestia time to interject. “You spit on everything she had to offer you, and for what? For your ‘little ponies’, you claim. Ha! Your coddled infants, if you had your way! You cling to them so desperately that you may well smother them! They do not need you, sister. They have not needed you for years. Decades. Perhaps even centuries. Every year you stay and ‘rule’ over them, you stunt them that much more. So, yes, I am leaving. If you really were the all-wise ruler you pretend to be, you would leave them too. Instead, you will stay, and cling to them, and pretend that they need you when the truth is that ‘tis you who needs them!”
Celestia hung in the air as though a spear had pierced her through. Luna’s words struck at her heart as surely as any lance. Her wings slowed. She fell, spiraling down towards the ground below.
Luna’s wings did not falter, they carried her up, higher, into the early morning light. “You have forced me to this, sister, just as you forced Twilight. I hope you will be happy with your eternity of ruling your helpless children alone.”
Then she was gone, a dark streak that vanished into the west, beyond the borders of Equestria.
Celesta landed amid the ruins of the shattered balcony. She sat, head bowed, wings folded, tears flowing from her eyes. There was an ache in her chest, a sharp, crippling pain that made her hunch over. Her whole body huddled with misery. She had thought that her heart had broken when Twilight left. Now it had been utterly shattered, and the spear that had struck it had been the spear of truth.
***
The cave could have been a dragon’s cave. It was not full if gems, but it did contain a vast hoard. Stored neatly in shelves cut into the cavern wall, the hoard consisted of thousands upon thousands of books. At the heart of the hoard sat Twilight Sparkle, one of her many books open before her. Paper was stacked beside her, and a quill hovered in a magenta glow, occasionally scribbling down some note on what she read.
She smiled now and then as she worked, but the rest of the time her face bore an expression of distant melancholy. She was not sad, not exactly, but there was a sadness in her that she’d carried so long it was like an old friend. She could not imagine a world without it.
A soft chime sounded, alerting her to the fact that something had entered the distant mouth of the cave. She set down her quill and rose to investigate. When she had threaded her way through the winding passages to the cave’s entrance, she found herself looking at a face that was at once both familiar and strange. The white alicorn that stood there was one she knew very well indeed. Yet Celestia’s face was thin and haggard as Twilight had never before known it. Her coat was dirty and uncombed. Her mane and tail no longer flowed perfectly with rainbow color, they were pink, and limp, an uncombed mess, speckled with dirt. Her eyes were haunted and full of shadows.
“You,” said Twilight darkly, the ancient scar over her heart opening anew. “What are you doing here?”
Celestia did something that Twilight could not have expected. She bowed. Not a mere ducking of the head, not a simple craning of the neck, she bowed until her horn nearly touched the cavern floor. “I am sorry, Twilight.”
Twilight glared, her ears flat back, her wings half spreading as she snapped, “You can’t just walk in here and say you’re sorry.”
Celestia straightened, but looked away from Twilight. “I know. I know I can’t expect you to simply take me back. Nevertheless, I wanted to tell you that I am sorry. I told myself that my ponies needed me, but that was an excuse. I needed them. I needed to be their perfect princess. I think I’d been Princess Celestia so long that I’d forgotten how to be Sola Celestia. I put Princess Celestia ahead of what you, and what everypony needed. That was wrong of me, and I am sorry.”
Twilight’s wings mantled, her eyes flashing. “You come to say that to me now! Why not when we first fought over this? Why not when we last fought over this? Why now?”
“Because I was afraid. Because I was an idiot. Because many reasons… none of them good enough. But also because I finally realized what I’d thrown away. Because I remembered what we once had.” She turned her head away from Twilight with a soft sigh. “I know we can’t have it again, I may be a fool, but I’m not that big of a fool.”
Twilight snorted. “You yourself told me that it’s no use regretting the past, you can only go forward. Unless you mess around with time travel, and that always turns out to be futile, when it doesn’t turn into a universe-breaking paradox.”
“I could almost try time travel. It might be worth breaking the universe, for you.” Celestia suddenly smiled, a tiny ghost of the smile that Twilight knew so well. “You could fix it for me. You fixed so many of my mistakes over the years.”
Twilight sighed, unable to stay angry any longer. “When I wasn’t fixing my own mistakes, yes.”
“You had a few good ones. None as terrible as what I’ve done, but you did have a talent for trouble. Remember the time that you accidentally turned Pinkie Pie into an alicorn?”
Twilight blushed faintly. “That was our first real makeout session, when we were stuck in your workroom all night.” She suddenly shot Celestia a flat, serious look. “Don’t think that reminiscing will make me forget what you’ve done, though.”
“I don’t, Twilight.” Celestia’s head hung again. “Forgive me. I’m not trying to manipulate you, I promise. I just…” She turned away from Twilight, a glint as she did revealing that tears were gathering in her eyes. “I just wanted to tell you that I was wrong, and I am sorry. I should go now.”
She turned and began to walk away. For a moment Twilight almost let her go. “How long?”
Celestia looked back at her, faintly puzzled.
“How long did it take you to find this cave?” asked Twilight.
“Oh. About three years.”
“What else did you do during those years?”
Celestia hesitated, then slowly answered, “Nothing. I looked for you, that’s all.”
“You didn’t fly back to Canterlot, to make sure that Equestria didn’t need you?”
“No. You were right all along, they don’t. I’m sure they had their problems, but if I keep fixing every problem they have, they will never be able to stand without me. So no, I haven’t been back since Luna… since I left.”
Suddenly Twilight was galloping across the cavern. She flung forelegs and wings both around Celestia and hugged her. “You really mean it,” she whispered.
Celestia, confused but hopeful, hugged her back. “Mean what?”
“That you won’t go back. That you were wrong. That… that you love me,” said Twilight.
“Yes,” said Celestia simply.
Twilight’s lips were suddenly pressed to Celestia’s, and her forelegs tightened around her, pulling their bodies close. She kissed Celestia with a deep fervor that Celestia returned wholeheartedly. Their tongues twined together, their hearts pounding, their wings folded around each other, creating a wall of purple and white feathers that shut out the rest of the world, leaving only the two of them; no longer teacher and student, no longer rulers, no longer anything at all save lovers at last.
=====================================================================
Ambion/Knight of Lycaeus
Heretic/Wonderland
Twilight Sparkle struggled to keep up with Celestia as the map slapped once again into her face. Wrestling the overly affectionate paper down, she struggled to hold it open as she flew against the headwind. Sandswept hilltops and lush valleys hidden away between lay below them, far as the eye could see. Clouds and the shadows of clouds slid sedately over the landscape beneath them. Lovely, yes, but nothing like what was on the map, with neatly plotted little lines detailing every direction they were to travel. By rights they should be flying east to reach the next site on their honeymoon’s well planned itinerary, not south.
Yet south they flew, with Celestia in the lead being stubbornly evasive about just where they were going.
“This definitely isn’t on the itinerary!” Twilight called out, having to shout over the droning wind that tugged at feathers, mane and tail.
With a great flourish of her wings Celestia caught the wind so that it carried her back to Twilight’s side. “Put that away, will you? I know where we’re going.”
“But I don’t,” Twilight shouted, though it wasn’t really necessary anymore and made her feel a bit embarrassed. “Tell me already.”
Celestia frowned. “It’s not something I can put into words. Not as such, no. It is something I remembered. And having remembered, I want you to see.”
Grudgingly Twilight folded up the map and sent it away with a flash of magic. “Well alright,” she said, her downcast eyes coming back up with a smile. “If it’s important to you, than it’s important to me. Whatever that may be.”
Even abreast as they were, Twilight had still been following Celestia’s lead, so it surprised her when she realized that this had lead into a gradual downward gradient. Their unplanned destination must have been within the bounds of the horizon. Somewhere in this cracked land of verdant pockets that spilled over onto sunbaked stone.
Celestia made the motion that she was going to be landing, and had angled herself steeper still, down towards one of the few pockets of greenery, to the eye no different than any other. The pair landed on lush grass, bordering an oasis half-hid between the rocks of this vast, desolate wasteland. The oasis was full of life, with the soft and myriad calls of birds, insects and amphibians alike. Though for all that, for all the bright little eyes of countless creatures watching curiously, Twilight had the innate feeling that of ponies, of any intelligent life at all, they were the only two. And perhaps had been for a very long time.
Sunlight trickled through the leaves and glinted off the crystal-clear water. Loam gave way readily underhoof and, brushing away a hanging curtain of moss Twilight saw that, unihabited or not, there were some indications to the past; ruined remains of stones lined up far too neatly to have been the work of nature. She pushed more moss aside, then tore it down in clumps that fell with sodden finality onto the soil at her hooves. However, what was once on these stones was unclear, the effects of time had not been kind to these once proud monoliths; wind and rain over the long years had worn down the once distinct carvings.
“Celestia, take a look at these. They’re damaged, but even then I don’t recognize the markings at all. Do you think...Celestia?”
She was standing at the water’s edge, gazing down at a reflection that was nearly perfect, distorted with only the slightest of ripples.
“What is this place?” asked Twilight, “Is this what you wanted to show me? Hey!” she called, and flung a lump of the dripping moss at her spouse. It smacked into the side of Celestia’s head with a satisfying splat. The alicorn was startled and blinked. She plucked the moss from its brief perch and started at it as if it were the strangest thing.
Then she let it fall, and as it scattered her reflection entirely she found herself smiling. “Sorry,” she said, turning away from the oasis. “It seems you’ve caught me reminiscing.”
“About what? About what’s carved on these stones?”
“Yes, they were a part of it. But this is only the start.” She motioned for Twilight to follow her as she made her way to a faint pathway that Twilight had not known or noticed was there. As they began walking, Twilight noted that the path was leading them gradually upwards likely to the peak of the squat hill she could see before them. The path like all else was weathered and faint, little detail could be made of what was likely once a smooth pathway up the hill.
The trail likely only survived at all from the use of whatever animals passed through here, and yet Twilight could not help but feel the weight of a history long since vanished looking down at her. The ruined stones and their unknowable remains drew her attention to the largest of the monoliths, a bleak expanse of stone that, all these eons later, still seemed to hold a grudge at having been hauled from its home of barren scarcity and forced to stand in this crowded greenery. Standing tall and free of the pervasive moss, Twilight could make out the detailed images that ponies long ago had made.
Twilight gawked, touching her hoof to the gritty stone. “Oh, wow.”
Pegasi, Unicorns, and Earth Ponies; all were present. Each carried an item that was just as varied in size and shape as the ponies themselves; together the ponies formed lines, processions leading towards the giant sun which dominated the panel. At its heart was a large pony, a unicorn seated on a throne. The pilgrims brought their gifts close to the magnificence of the sun and from its perimeter tossed their gifts into the everlasting flames.
“This...this is incredible. Was this what you wanted me to see, this mural of this unicorn standing above the others?”
Celestia didn’t answer. Not right at first. She raised her hoof to the central figure, brushing sand away from it with gentle purpose. “This is...another part of it.”
Twilight peered closely at a lower point, where a pony readied to throw his offering to the figure above. “Is that...is that a slice of cake he’s holding? They didn’t actually burn food, did they?”
Celestia chuckled through a tight-lipped smile. “No, dear, they did not. It is just the liberties of artistic license at work.”
Her stomach loudly grumbled.
Twilight grinned. “It must have been a pretty good cake.”
Celestia suddenly turned away, leaving the figure once more to its isolation and burning gifts. “Yes, I imagine it was.”
The pair then continued upwards along the trail passing pedestals, statues, vases, mosaics, murals, all manners of art. All were done in exacting and excruciating detail, regardless of the scene each depicted a common theme of a unicorn pony framed by the rays of the splendid sun.
Gradually the path had began to widen, and as they headed uphill into harder, sparser ground. The higher they went, the fewer crumbling vestiges lining the path they saw; once the last struggling weeds were behind them Twilight Sparkle realized why. The summit, scoured by the relentless elements, was flat and unremarkable. The absolute and unrestricted view of the skies, however, was something else entirely.
“That’s amazing,” Twilight intoned, her eyes turned to the sunlit horizon. After a time, her gaze descended back to the earth, and to the small plateau’s lone sentinel.
Roughly marking center to the small plateau, the monolith stood at a great height. As extensively detailed and delicately crafted as the others had been, they had been but ordinary stone. This, however, in every errant sunbeam glinted with the many hues of minerals or metals, none of which Twilight recognized. If it had been created, than it had been done so with great pains. Or even had it been natural, moving such a thing to so remote a place would have been daunting work, an act of dedication.
The design etched into the monolith was larger than any other they had passed on the way up and it stood as its brethrens below did, tall and proud with the skills of ponies long past clearly visible on its stony surface. The image depicted the same unicorn in full glory, the pony in mid-leap and with its shining horn ablaze. Surrounding the pony was the rising sun and gathered below was a multitude of ponies all kneeling in homage before it.
“This is the place,” Twilight Sparkle said, almost entranced by the shifting colours. “This is where they gathered.” She closed her eyes, letting her hoof trace a slow path along the ancient lines, ever-beautiful and defiant to the ravages of nature and time. “It’s you,” she said breathlessly, “but where are your wings?”
Celestia sighed, though even with her eyes closed Twilight knew there to be a smile there. “Once again, the artistic license of the past makes a mystery for the future. Look again, my wings are there. Just not as you expect to see them.”
Eyes open, Twilight peered into the relief. Silent, as if listening to the wind, or to the very stone itself. “The rays of the sun,” and she knew it to be true even as she said it. She turned to Celestia with eyes wide in revelation. “You don’t just move the sun, you are the sun.”
She blinked twice, then lightly laughed. “I married the sun.”
Celestia didn’t share in the humour. “No, but that is how they saw me, and the beliefs of a thousand will always oust the truth of one.”
“And you were the one. One sun, one sun,” Twilight said, giggling at her rhyme and shaking her head at the immensity of it all. “Wow.”
The white alicorn frowned, “Please, Twilight, don’t-”
With wings flared, Twilight shook her head. She was smiling, a great big smile like the dawn. “It’s alright, you don’t understand. I don’t care if you are the sun or not. I know who you are. I know who I married, and why I married her.
I know she’s not perfect. I know she’s not this picture, pretty as it may be.” Twilight blushed, momentarily distracted. “My Celestia is much prettier anyway,” she mused. “Ah! But as I was saying, I know you. And I wouldn’t change that. Not any of it.”
Her jaw set with grim determination, Twilight Sparkle turned on the monolith. The rising currents of magic were palpable in the air, a shimmering corona of purple lights that danced around the young alicorn. The ancient stone was resistant, mightily so, but with her hooves braced into the rock and growling with the effort, she overpowered it. There was a brilliant flash of purple and white, knocking Twilight to her backside.
The spell’s light faded. Panting and satisfied, Twilight called Celestia over. “Take a look,” she said breathlessly.
Look she did, and gone was the familiar image. Gone were the pilgrims, the aloof sun, the burning offerings. In its place, in lines still glowing faintly with the vibrancy of their creation, a simple image. Two alicorns, one large and one small. They were nuzzling, the affection clear in every reborn line.
Blinking, Celestia realized she had started crying. Somehow, that made her smile.
“You couldn’t just carve our initials into a tree like an ordinary couple, could you?”
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Awww.... I mean, I'm MANLY!
I'm trying to upvote this but it's not letting me do it more than once.
4339151
Protest about it! KNIGHTY MUST FIX!!
Love the continuation of some of these. Especially the ones where Celestia and Twilight have a daughter.
It is at times like these that I feel collections like this are disadvantaged by being all a single story.
In other words: "Gods dammit, I wish I could upvote this on a chapter-by-chapter basis~!"
[We really need a luna 
]
4339205 viva la revolucion!
4341307 You get an upvote! You get an up vote! You get an upvote! Everybrony gets an upvote!
That last one was my favourite out of these^^ The giving birth to their daughter one was pretty good too, especially the part where Celestia finally understood why Twilight had been so protective over her. But I have one thin to ask... Why the F is Kyubey there? O.o