A New Teacher

by Sparky Brony

Chapter 16. Luna, really?

Once again I'm on the train. I look over at Twilight.

"She said immediately?" I mean come on, when I didn't run out the door towards the train station, she just picked me up in her magic and floated me along. I had to apologize profusely for some rude words I uttered in her general direction. But she deserved it, she knows how much I dislike being ponyhandled by magic. Her only saving grace? She's stressed. I mean she's got a lot of saving graces in my book, being my marefriend, but I calmed down quickly once I saw the look on her face.

She growled a little at me, stress, I have to keep in mind the stress, "Yes, Nick. Princess Luna has never summoned me to Canterlot. So the very fact she's summoned us means it's important."

"Perhaps it's something benign. Maybe she just wants to meet the new pony here in Equestria."

Twilight huffs, "Nick, shortly after you first got here I sent a letter to Celestia, talking about the new pony. This has to be different or else she would have asked for you right away."

I look at her, "Twilight, is this a fear of the unknown? You don't know what's going on, so you are stressing about it?"
She gave me a dirty look, "Nick. I don't know Princess Luna that well. After we broke the power of Nightmare Moon, I helped her some when it comes to acclimating to today's times, but other than that I haven’t spent much time with her."

I have to tread carefully. Twilight is extremely smart, if my tongue ties up on me while we are talking, she will be able to deduce that something is up. And I value my relationship with Twilight too much to allow that. "So, what happened? I was just told she was locked up on the moon for a thousand years."

She sighed, "Well, it was her, but it wasn't. She was Nightmare Moon, she wasn't the Luna she is now. Her mind was twisted, she was twisted. She wasn't the pony you will be meeting soon. She wanted the night to last forever. She envied how the ponies played during the day, and slept during her beautiful night." She sighed again. "She felt that she was irrelevant as a Princess of Night. No ponies were out at night to appreciate her work. She felt her best roles in Equestria were…" she trailed off, looking out the windows, I watched her work through her emotions, she finally murmured, "just smiling and waving."

Quite a few things that Twilight had been saying to me over the last few months just suddenly gelled, "And you are worried about you? She was corrupted, and you think it might be a possibility for you?"

Her eyes widen as she heard me. Ears standing straight up, she turns and looks at me, "Nick…" She trails off as she looks down. Finally tears start to form in her eyes as she slowly nods.

I pull her into a hug, "Twilight, There is no way that you will end up that way."

Her ears drop and she looks at me with those big puppy dog eyes, "Are you sure?"

I nod confidently, "Yes, Twilight. You have your friends, you have me. The situation is completely different."

She leans into me, "I guess you are right, Nick." She leans in harder as I wrap my wing around her. She looks out the window, "We are almost at Canterlot, we had better get ready to get off the train."

I close my eyes as I feel her warmth next to me, "A few more minutes, the train hasn't even started to slow down yet."
She sighs as she presses closer, "I think we can spare a few minutes."

***

Have I said recently that the inside of the castle in Canterlot is huge? It took us nearly ten minutes of walking just to get near the throne room. Finally we sit and wait for the day court to finish. So, I just sit there, basking in the fact I'm sitting next to Twilight. After a very frustrating wait, the doors open and a dozen or so Canterlot ponies file out, the guard gestures for us to enter. And very shortly we are standing in front of Princess Luna.

Twilight looks around, "Princess Luna, where is Princess Celestia? You don't usually hold day court."

Luna comes down from her throne, "Bah, one of the many duties I have to deal with here. Uptight nobles and their wants." She comes and sits in front of both of us. She smiles then looks serious. "My sister has been performing her duties without fail for over a thousand years. I was finally able to convince her that she should take a vacation. She has left the duties to me, and she is resting and relaxing, as far away from politics as possible."

Twilights ears drop, "For how long?"

"For the last four months."

That causes me to start. I've been in Equestria for four months now.

Twilight looks confused, "So, for the last four months, the letters I've gotten from Celestia…"

"Have been written by me, yes, Princess Twilight. She decided that making her sabbatical widespread knowledge would be…" she smiled, "inconvenient. So the nobles here have been sworn to not talk about it under the threat of royal fines, and she promised them that those fines would be steep." The smile turned evil. "And they are, the one family that tried to leak to the press found that out. I made sure the Canterlot press is aware of the situation, and is complying with her request."

I nudged Twilight, she moved forward a bit. "So, Princess, what is it you summoned me for?"

"I would say summoned is rather a strong word for what I wrote Princess Twilight. I asked you to Canterlot at your earliest convenience. You rode the first train here. I did not require that. But I do appreciate it."

Confusion reigned on Twilights face, "So, why did you want me here?"

Luna looks directly at me, "Because of him."

Oh no. "Me, your highness?"

A nod. "And your new relationship with Twilight Sparkle."

Time to tread carefully, "Um, I don't know exactly what Twilight wrote in her letter to you, Princess. But I have fallen in love with this mare."

Twilight wraps her wing around me, "And I have fallen in love with him."

Luna claps her hooves together, "Excellent." She looks at Twilight, "And have you learned anything from your feelings, for example how important love is?"

Twilight looks thoughtful, "Yes, Princess. I think I have. Cadence has told me some about the power that is love, how similar, and yet how different it is from the power that is friendship. They are very similar, but the intensity." She stops for a second and looks at me lovingly, "The intensity is amazing. I understand now how Cadence's love for my brother was able to give him power, and was able to repel the changelings. The power, the intensity, is amazing." She stops for a moment to think, "but I can't say that it's stronger than friendship, but on par with it, I would have to say. Even now, I find it hard to explain."

Luna smiles, "Just try your best, Princess."

She stops and thinks for a bit, "To truly be happy, to truly be well rounded, to know what makes your life important, you need friends, and you need to understand love."

Luna smiles hugely and once again claps her hooves together. "Wonderful, wonderful. Exactly what I wanted to hear." She looks at Twilight, "Princess Twilight, may I steal your stallion to talk to him for a little bit? I want to know more about what makes him tick."
Twilight looks nervous but nods as Luna draws me into the royal offices. After we enter she turns on me.

"Well, Nick. I brought you here. And I am happy that my plans have worked out." She giggles, "In fact, they worked out even better than my plans. Bringing you here to have Twilight and you fall in love was a stroke of genius on my part. I knew when I first saw your dreams that you would be excellent for Twilight. You are different enough to be interesting, and yet similar enough to be compatible. You were the perfect choice."

I sit down in confusion, "My dreams, I don't know, Princess. My dreams while I was drifting in the ocean probably weren't anything to go by."

"You silly human turned pony. I watched your dreams for many nights."

What? "You were watching me before the engines failed on my airplane? Dumping me in the middle of the Atlantic?"

Her smile became rather strained, "Well, uhh, yes."

I look down. "Two engines failing wasn't some horrible accident from bad quality control at GE, was it?"

A long silence.

"Well, Princess?"

A long sigh, "No, Nick. I was searching for nearly a week, and focused on you very quickly. I had to find a situation to get you here."
Her horn lights up as I leap towards her, I'm caught in her magic.

"You miserable bitch, I had a life, I was respected, I was happy in my home." I then utter a long stream of curse words that I had picked up here and there. It's the Navy man in me talking. I insulted her heritage, her mane, her horn, her cutie mark, and everything else I could think of in my rage. After several loud minutes I finally wound down.

"Am I required to hold you back again, Nicholas?"

I sigh and shake my head, her magic releases me and I drop to the floor. I stand up slowly and shake my head. "I was brought here as a plot for you to teach Twilight about love, you make me…" I'm interrupted by a muffled sob from the door, which apparently wasn't fully closed. My eyes widen. No!

I dash to the door and wrench it open. I can see Twilight running towards the doors of the throne room, her magic wrenching them open so hard one of the hinges breaks. She skids as she makes the turn and then there is a magenta flash, she just teleported.
I turn back to Luna, "Whatever you did to curse me to not revealing this stupid mission you put me on, I need you to remove it."

She sighs and her horn lights up, "Done."

"Where would she go when upset?"

Luna's face falls. "I am not certain, Nick. When she was a student here, she spent most of her time in the observatory."
I dash from the room, using my wings to aid my speed.

It took forever, and I had to ask three, yes three different ponies how to get to the observatory. I don't bother knocking. The door isn't locked, I trot in. Once I get through the doors, I can hear her, I trot up the stairs to where the telescope is, she's laying in a nook, her head on her forelegs, and I can hear her sobbing. I move up close to her and extend my wing.

"Get back, you son of a bitch." She punctuates her scream with a blast of magic, throwing me across the room. I spread my wings to control my flight and I land on my hooves, in moments I'm next to her again.

"Twilight… I'm…" Once again I'm blasted across the room, this time there is more than concussive force, I can feel my fur singed where her blast hit me. I trot back to her, slower this time.

"Twilight, I'm sorry." I say quickly to forestall another blast. In vain, I might add. Once again, I'm singed, and I think I lost a few feathers and more than a little fur in that one. I try again, I just don't get as close this time.

"Twilight, what you heard…"

She overwhelms my words, "I heard enough from you, you son of a bitch. I fell in love with you." She sobs as she says the last, then steels herself. "I gave myself to you, heart, body, and soul." My ears flatten at her volume. I might have some permanent hearing loss from this exchange. "And I find out this is a sick plot between you and Luna…" her tears overwhelm her again. I sit on my haunches, trying to think.

"Twilight, this isn't…"

Once again, I'm interrupted, "I did love you, with all of my being. And now…" She paws the ground with a hoof and snorts… "Now, I hate you."

Author's Note:

I love my editor, I've been itching to post this chapter, I think it turned out really well. And he came through, I'm working on another chapter for my usual weekly update for this story. But if I get enthused about the chapter, I might post early. But Nick's life is in the toilet right now, what is he going to do to fix this problem?

Comments

[Snowfyre]

i sorta hope that they wont instantly make up if they ever do that day

[Phenrys]

Oh man, the feels! Eeyup, it's not his fault, but I can't blame her.

[ThEvErYdErPyBrOnY]

Well :calls applejack* yeah I need you in canterlot yeah thanks*hangs up*

[SuperwhoPegasister]

FEEEEEEEEEEELS

[Phoenix Flames]

Wait I've got a couple of things to say:
1. Luna is sounding like a creepy stalker
2. I love the chemistry between Twi and Nick
3. Luna you just became a big jerk. (That was hard to say considering the fact that I'm a Luna fangirl)
4. Twilight is heartbroken and crying so why am I not as mad as I was when Jerk Sentry did it.

[Titan Commander Sebaste]

Luna, you dun goofed!