Love doesn't always last forever. And sometimes it can crumble so spectacularly that you never want to see or speak to the other person again.
Celestia was perfectly content with that. But when Twilight Sparkle suddenly appears at the palace in Canterlot, after a century of silence, she has no choice but to talk to her.
Politely, of course. Always politely.
*Credit and many thanks go to littlerobotbird for the concept and editing of the cover art. As near as I can tell, the original picture is Jykinturah's work, but the source post seems to be gone.*
Chapters (1)
Hmm... this certainly is a different story. Very few i've seen, have covered interactions from an old relationship that's ended badly. Still, it didn't end as bad as my mind had prepared for.
Have a fave and a thumb, you've earned them.
This... Now this is sad.
really strong dialogue and a fantastic story for those who've read too many twilestia ships
Agreed. Most stories focus on the start of the relationship, rather then way down the line.
A moustache to you good sir!
Everyone brings up the age thing. To be honest, I don't really get it. Apparently Celestia's body never ages, and maturity of the mental sort is acquired early on (just honed as time progresses). Surely an "of age" Twilight should be allowed to court/be courted by Celestia. Maybe it's just me, I have gone through life trusting everyone and accepting every ... Most things.
Story: I see the sad tag, and I respect it. I wish there was a "Bittersweet" tag, or something. Well done.
I loved it, and at the same time disliked it. (tho I faved it fo sho) Mainly because it pokes my feels to see a Twilestia ship end badly. I sorta wanted Celestia to ask Twilight to come back, or at least want to ask her to come back. A part of me hopes that if Twilight goes through with dying then Celestia goes into a deep bout of depression or something. After all, she drove Twilight away.
2082396 Thanks! I would be okay with a "bittersweet" tag for this story, but honestly I think I would prefer a drama tag. For stories whose main goal is dramatic intensity, intensity of emotion, etc., without those emotions necessarily being about making the reader feel sad. For my money it could replace Tragedy, since Tragedy is about how a story progresses/ends, and not a descriptor of tone like comedy/sad or a description of what type of events a story contains, like romance or adventure. And who wants to give away their ending in a tag (which I sorta feel like bittersweet would do too)?
As far as the age thing goes--personally it's not the age difference that concerns me. As... some fic or other once put it, "What, is Celestia supposed to find someone her own age to be with?" Although a great difference in experience and background can make romance across generations hard. Celestia probably knows jokes that stopped making sense before anyone alive was conceived.
But what I actually think is problematic is the transition of the relationship from 7-year-old mentee / adult mentor to an equal romantic relationship. Celestia and Twi probably played kiddie games and suchlike. That sort of thing could really foul up Celestia's ability to see Twilight as an adult, even if she wanted to. But Celestia also has a lot of experience seeing a pony's whole life pass, so... *shrugs* It's doable for sure, but I mean, imagine dating someone you knew back when they were five and you were fifteen, and then multiply that awkwardness by a bunch.
Of course, I'm of the opinion that while ships might be cute for the reasons that they work, they're interesting for the reasons they shouldn't work, but do anyway.
2082498
God I like you already. You argue so many good points for that ship. I'll admit, Twilestia is a special ship for me in the fact that it's using the original meaning of "ship". Normally people assume it to be a wholly romantic thing (it almost is). I use it to refer to an 'exploration of a relationship between two characters'. Celestia as Twilight's lover is, I'll admit, OTP for me. However, those teary-eyed exchanges between an old/immortal Twilight... They absolutely kill me inside. The mentor/student relationship they have is just too sacred. Nine times out of ten, that's the number one barrier between a romantic relationship between them. Getting past that is how I judge the Twilestia stories mostly.
This turned into me ranting about my opinion. I started typing with the intent to agree with you. It would appear I'm just too human to do that!
Agreed. That's why I actually prefer 'Momlestia' where she's her mother figure. (not necessarily her mother, but you get the idea, ya? Even though that is still acceptable.)
See the first line in this post. I like you. I can never explain what I think, simply because my brain doesn't think in words. But THAT right there is the line of reasoning I've been looking for for a long time.
Dramatic, a little depressin to be honest. But the endin, that's jus sweet. This is my favorite kind of ship, no matter who they are, the ones that can show adversity, understanding, a resolve to make things right. I find myself wanting to know what happened in greater detail. And maybe I missed it, but why spike would be pissed at twi. This short piece of writin is what makes me love this site and all the brony community. Keep on writin Hoss, you do it well
This is quiet great, this story has enough to make sense of the main themes, but some stuff are still open ended and vague enough for you to continue writing in this "universe" if you decide so, and i hope you do one day.
2082498 this story works as a Tragedy. It explores Twilight and Celestia's flaws bringing them apart in a linear way by implication, not by actual description in story. But a character (or characters) who are otherwise happy having the things they loved destroyed by a singular flaw in their personality (Twilight's sensitivity, Celestia's self-sacrificing) is tragedy by definition.
2082498 I think that the playing childhood games thing together just makes their relationship stronger, not weaker. They both know each other at a very intuitive level. As for equal footing, a lot of stories forget Twilight's contributions to Equestria include things Celestia couldn't do for her own subjects. She saved the Crystal Empire where Celestia saw it vanish for a thousand years, she redeemed Luna where Celestia trapped her on the moon and beat Discord in a day where it took Celestia years (admittedly with some help from her mentor, but still). I think Celestia sees herself as inferior to Twilight in character if not in experience, something that certain stories on this site ( Colloquium, Composure and Eternal in particular) touch on quite nicely. Not only that, but Twilight is a submissive pony by default, so I imagine most relationships with her would seem unequal between her and her partner.
The story's good but the final lines are absolutely fantastic!
It was a pleasure pre-reading this for you, and even better to see it uploaded!
Very nice you have my fav and upvote
Brilliantly executed treatment of the other side of the Twilestia ship: how do you keep a relationship fresh and interesting for eternity? Answer is, you might not be able to. Applies to TwiLuna by extension as well. The dialogue and characterizations were perfect; bonus points for not delving into unnecessary backstory. Gold star and thumbs up for you! And a well-deserved spot in the Featured box as well, I see.
IMHO, that exchange, right at the end of this remarkably-written tale, pretty much sums up the whole argument and the pain that Twilight Sparkle was feeling. Sometimes, it is enough to just have a reason to face each successive day.
I also suspect that the reason Twilight was so biting at first was that she hoped that she might provoke Celestia into killing her.
This is an excellent story. Yeah, there are grammar and wording oddities, but the idea is done well enough that they don't matter one wit. As a Twilestia fan, this hits me harder than I would have liked. You never want to see the ride end.
There aren't enough bittersweet stories on here.
This needs to shoot to the top ASAP.
2083681 I would offer this: Is all you want out of a relationship that it be fresh and interesting? If so, you may just want to consider getting a new pet.
Actual love, not merely romantic infatuation, is far deeper and more powerfully enduring than such surface fascinations.
Commence read.
This was interesting.
Nicely done dialogue and how they interacted with each other.
Fitting for the Sad tag.
Ive read so many sad stories today
2083686
Killing her, forcibly removing her immortality, banishing her to the moon... anything to end it.
2083848
True. But I think one of the points of this story is that there are complications to immortal romance that even love will have trouble overcoming. What once felt comfortable and safe may start to feel routine, and what's worse, it may be too comfortable, too safe. The story shows us that Twilight withdrew from the world and turned entirely to Celestia, and that Celestia had to end it because of that. Celestia says "the world would be a brighter, better place with this mare in it", and Twilight had ceased to be in the world at all. Love may endure but in Twilight's case it became a crutch, a reason not to go on with the real business of living.
Of course, my preference would have been to have Twilight jump ship for Luna, but that's another story.
I don't buy this. It features a love of two characters that got to the point Celestia seriously entertained a forever relationship - she made Twilight immortal - then spurns her for another lover. Yeah no. Relationships can and do fall apart... But it seems I managed to last the test of time for a while, all to fall apart a moment later (in the eyes of the immortal).
It as a piece succeeds in evoking emotion after a first read for which the author gets kudos, but the step after, taking a closer eye on it it just comes across as contrived and sad just for the point of being sad.
4/10 thumbs down.
Nice. I wouldn't say it's sad really, more it starts angry, goes through hopeless and ends up pretty optimistic. And nice to see what happens when Ships Go Wrong. It's very definitely an ex-lover's tiff rather'n sad. The dialoge was all pretty finely done, too.
G'job!
2084248 Angry! That's the tag we're missing. Get to it, knighty. (Oh God, can you imagine the trollfics?)
But no, I do wish there was a better fit, tag-wise. Although some people have made a pretty strong case for calling it "sad" by... saying how sad it made them. So I suppose there's that.
2084164 Thanks, Clopple. I'm totally going to get a poster made that says "What a beautiful story . . . this told it like it is." After I frame the screencap of me in the top featured slot.
Yeah I'm a little excited.
It's probably a good thing I do not have picture-framing technology at hand.
2084177 Oh my god someone just did analysis on a story I wrote. And supported their point with a quote.
Someone cared enough about what I was saying to argue their personal interpretation, and used my words to support that interpretation.
You guys, we would need a smiling-with-giant-tears-in-the-desuest-of-eyes emoticon to accurately capture my expression right now. Seriously, that may have made my week. And it's been a pretty solid week so far.
(Yeah, I'm an English major, can you tell?)
Thanks so much not just for those but for all the kind remarks. And the critical ones too. I'm just proud to have written something that seems to have resonated with so many different people.
2083848
And I would offer this. If a relationship becomes boring or stale, no matter the love present, it is tenuous at best. To become stagnant is one of the worst things that can happen.
This... is a good story.
It is good, but I feel too unsettled to say I enjoyed reading it.
I like characters to face hardships to earn their happy endings. I dislike non-endings, where nothing changes. Reading through 200 000 words just to reach the end of a story, just to see the characters suffer at the end, and to see that the whole journey was pointless feels like a huge giant "fuck you" for the reader - thankfully, stories like that are fairly rare.
And this...
I can't tell what kind of ending this is, exactly, but seeing something like love, just fall apart and sputter out... it's a little too close for comfort.
This is a good story, but I wish I hadn't read it.
The only question for the rumours is- before or after the season three premiere? because the rumours were starting by the end of the first episode.
I know this is meant to be a one-shot, but I wouldn't mind seeing a followup.
As a general rule of thumb, I don't like happy endings. They just don't have the same lasting effect, for me at least. No emotion seems to stick with you if "everything is going to be alright", and it lowers the quality of the story. I don't see this piece as an exception.
That being said, I still highly enjoyed the story. I don't make a habit out of reading stories where there is blatant animosity between Twilight and Celestia, but I'm glad I picked this up.
Thanks for the read.
2084350 Well, since you ask, the original googledoc of this story has its first editorial note dated August 31st (no, I did not write this story any faster than any other story I've written for this site*). Season premiere was in... geez, November? So, I guess I was right and it was considerably before people were talking about it.
*I did, however, finish the story in like a week once I picked it back up. It was a thing where I'd forgotten about it and one night before going to sleep I suddenly saw how the whole rest of it played out in my head and had a bunch of enthusiasm to actually write it down.
2084288
Glad I could make your week! I feel the same way whenever someone posts more than "d'aaawww" on my stories too. You've done a beautiful job with this little slice of (broken) Twilestia, and you deserve every kudo you've received. It's a really engaging, heartrending piece that could have been tragic or pointlessly shippy but instead manages to end on the most hopeful note possible given the circumstances. There's just so much depth and subtlety and half-unspoken backstory woven in here that I could continue that analysis for pages - but I won't, because I need to get back to my own stories. You've got a follower, and now I've got "Lost Friends" in my Read Later list.
2084177 But what we see here with Twilight is less love than borderline obsession. People who love each other deeply do not feel a compulsive need to stand next to each other at every moment. They can actually have LIVES that do not utterly revolve around each other perpetually.
2084368 *walks in and infects all the ponies with hoof-and-mouth disease and they die slowly and horribly* Better now? What? It's a bad ending! Nopony is happy! It's just what you wanted...
So many likes. So few comments... I think everyone is too amazed to try to write down a comment, because it won't capture accurately what they're feeling... At least, that's what I think...
>>> For Shining and Cadence's wedding anniversary.” “Ah, yes. 350 years, isn't it?”>>> How interesting, a relationship that has withstood the test of time. I cannot help but feel that the falling out between Twilight and Celestia has more to do with their personal problems than any deeper concepts. Indeed, that seems borne out as I read. Neither seems as rational or mature-minded as I would expect. Twilight least of all. Those cheap shots were what I would anticipate from a spoiled teenager, and which I would have crushed beneath my superior intellect (like I do with all teenagers' smarmy little comments. Now THAT is something I never get tired of doing!
)
>>>“There are those who'd say that tradition for tradition's sake is no more a virtue than meaningless change.” >>> Very true, Twilight. But then, what do you offer in the form of meaningful change? You have presented an unfinished concept, my dear. An incomplete conjecture. I am not impressed by half-thoughts.
>>>Do you remember what you told me? It was the same old advice actually, now that I think of it, but I took it—I trusted you, and I made new friends, and I lost them too—and it was worse. I... couldn't... stand going through that again. So I didn't want to see anyone. Didn't want to... to care about anyone else. Can you blame me? >>>
And there it is, the inability to deal with loss. Seriously, I came to grips with death by the age of 8. I see it as a supreme aggravation to be defeated like any other enemy. It's a waste of an intelligent mind which must be replaced and taught the same things all over again. Really, a much longer life with an undamaged mind would lead to far quicker advancement. Twilight needs to get over both death and herself.
>>>But, you know something Princess? If you stick around long enough, you see all the arguments, all the ideas, all the thoughts that anyone ever thinks and puts to paper. You read the same things you read fifty years, a hundred years ago. I know it all. I know it and I'm sick of it, and I'm sick of being sick of it, and I—”>>> Really Twilight? You honestly think you know everything? My dear, would you like me to show you the Library of Congress? It would take nearly a thousand years of constant reading to get through it all. And that's assuming you retain 100% of everything you read. Ah! And then, there some the practical applications of all those mixed disciplines! And then, how can you be sure that everything has been thought of? We have been delving deeply into our universe for hundreds of years, and still thousands of papers of novel information are published EVERY YEAR!! *shakes his head* Twilight, Twilight, you are a sorely disappointing individual. With such a limited scope of mind and that aggravatingly obsessive worship, it's no wonder Celestia sent you away. You haven't grown up at all.
*And in the end* Ah, finally, Twilight has at last opened herself to the possibility that all her problems are the result of her own mind, still trapped in the mortal way of thinking. (thankfully, I surpassed that when I was 10. I'm now into the multidimensional-multiple transcendent combinational entity state-of-mind. All of me are, as a matter of fact!)
... I want to say something more constructive then very nice... and I hope Celestia is NOT sleeping with Star Swirl in that sense.
2084302 And what, then, are the qualifications that determine when something is boring and stale? Answer: ONE'S OWN STATE OF MIND. It's a personal choice to become bored with something. Either that or a pathophysiologically low serotonin level (classic clinical depression symptom: patient has become bored with things that used to bring pleasure). Alcoholism and many drugs and even some diseases (metabolic syndrome, hyper/hypothyroidism, certain cancers) besides psychiatric etiology can bring about depressive perceptive shifts as well.
Again, the problems lie WITHIN, a flaw in reasoning, an emotional instability. It has nothing to do with the facts and theories of reality and existence. All thought; all emotion is, after all, all in your head. It can be whatever you wish it be once you fully comprehend and indoctrinate this absolute truth into how your mind functions via the transitions and connections between the biological basis and the more abstract portions of the consciousness. In simpler terms: if one learns to seize absolute control of the mind and identify illogical internal perceptive shifts, one finds reality frequently contrasts very sharply to former interpretations painted in a mind trapped in disarray.
That next-to-last line is just the right blend of sad and sweet, the thump of the tail of a dog recognizing an orphan returning to a cold and quiet house. I was surprised to find the twist from bitterness to reconciliation work so well. Well done, and thought-provoking.
Excellent!! This was great, in every way. This story hits off rather nicely you have Celestia, for the first time I've seen, get surprised. Very nice comical start. Then enter (Alicorn) Twilight, who tounge lashes her teacher/(ex)lover, very subtly, to both amusement and laugh of all, then you kick things down a notch with Twilight's revelations, and to top off the cake you introduce a new love Interest for Celestia (naughty naughty Alicorn). All in all a very fine read, can't tell if this was supposed to be sad, or angst, but I was laughing my plot off!!
If this wasn't marked complete i would be asking for more. Bravo, liked and favorited. Not often do i read "sad" and enjoy it as much as i enjoyed this.
so celestia wants twilight to live for eternity out of essentialy her own greed? i dunno this celestia seems to be more self centered and about herself.
Dammit, now I have to add a story with the sad tag to my favorites. I hope your happy.
Ugh, reading this makes me want to pull down the sad one I wrote, you manage to be subtle about the sadness but still have it, I have a feeling mine is much to subtle so its crap.
And so, Star Shift stood, invisible eye twitching, hidden by her spell having heard the entire. bucking. conversation!
Everyone wonders how any of the Mane 6 would handle immortality, and you've definitely made the telling point that tells us all "Not very well, if at all."
Twilight found out, and of course blames Celestia: "Why didn't you tell me it would be like this?" Even the truth - "You wouldn't have believed me if I had." - would have made it worse.
BUT, the somewhat reconciliation - more a burying the hatchet - was probably the best ending. And you get through eternity one day at a time, the same way you did with anything else.
Bravo Zulu.
Is it possible a sequel might come of this? Maybe about what happened between Twilight and Spike?
My very first fic involving alicorn Twilight. And one of my first fics since my first real venture into FiMFiction besides Death Note: Equestria. I... feel like I should have in mind a lot to say, but don't seem to (I seem to have this problem often--but then I get talking anyway and it works out and blah blah blah... but I digress), but meh.
Well... I dunno, that was great. The tension, the drama, the echoes of love that once was, and the implications of, as you called it, indefinite lifespan. It all came together wonderfully, I think. Given the context, I found it all very believable... and then we have a new darling, prodigy protege of Celestia's. I liked that part. lol
I dunno, I feel I'm running back into "oh noes, wat to say", so eh. I very much enjoyed the serious nature of this and the bittersweet factor at first, which indeed turns to reconciliation--not a return to how things were, but making up nonetheless. A very mature resolution, I would say. Job well done, will read again.
Also, I want to Follow Alondro just for posting brilliant things. Intelligent with an amusing sense of humor. I approve.
2085258 Happy you liked the story that much, certainly.
Not happy that you're disparaging your own work in comparison. Different stories need different levels of subtlety. It's just down to picking your tools. Like something like Les Miserables is deliberately unsubtle--it's all about big, raw emotions. Something like Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy on the other hand is so subtle you can miss displays of emotion when they happen. They're both very well loved though.
Don't regret the things you've written. Each one is a learning experience. If you're not happy with how a story turns out, then that shows you what to work on in your next one. I mean, I almost gave up on this story for various reasons--after the initial burst that got me through Celestia and Twi being passive aggressive for about a page and a half I wasn't sure it had merit. But now I'm very glad that I stuck it out and (eventually) figured out how to proceed in a way that made it into the story I wanted it to be.
As I have probably said too often by now: love is a mixture of the magical and the mundane, and you can't push it too far in either direction for too long.
Moreover, there isn't a couple in the known universe(s) that hasn't occasionally experienced a heightened level of snippy.
Which is why this utterly fantastic (in the original sense of the word) tale is so disturbingly realistic. Thumb way, way up.
I'd kinda like to see where Twilight goes with her life from here on out, but this is still a great standalone regardless