> When They Were Young: Operation: Cookie Liberation > by Mr101 > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- > Codename: C.O.O.K.I.E. > --------------------------------------------------------------------------                               Operation: Cookie Liberation Celestia let out a frustrated groan as she slowly walked back to her bedroom. It was about three thirty in the afternoon and she had decided she wanted a snack to eat before the family dinner that evening; her plans, though, had been thwarted by her mother, who had caught her trying to steal some cookies from the kitchen and had been sent to her bedroom until dinner.         “Almost…”         Celestia cackled quietly to herself as she reached for the cookie jar. She was wearing a full black body suit and a face mask that covered her muzzle up as well as a black headband, and was standing ontop of several boxes she had stacked in order to reach them.         “Almost…”         She grabbed the jar and cackled again as she sat down trying to pry the lid off when a cough caught her attention. With a slow turn, she looked back to see the unimpressed look of her mother standing in the room.         “Uhm… hi mum,” Celestia smiled innocently under her mask.         Pushing the memory into the back of her mind, she opened the door to her bedroom and closed it as her stomach growled. Discarding her ninja gear in a pile on the floor Celestia clambered into her bed and lay on her back with a pout she stared at the ceiling. After a moment, asly and almost evil grin formed on her face.         She slunk from her bed and slowly approached her desk. Looking around to make sure nopony was watching her, she opened the lower drawer and produced a small box and licked her lips at the contents.         “Victory tastes so sweet,” she giggled and pulled out a cookie.         “And once again, the day is saved thanks to Batmare and her awesome sidekick, Fluffykins the Wabbit Wonder!”         Luna bounced happily on her bed, giggling as the aforementioned Fluffykins flailed about around her. She stopped when she heard her stomach growl loudly and she bit her lip, looking at the clock, pouting as she read the time.         “Aww… still got two hours till dinner…”         As she tried to take her mind of her hunger, she heard her sister grumbling outside her room and silently made her way to her door and peaked out. Luna watched as Celestia walked into her room and closed the door, she decided to go and see what was wrong with Celestia. With a quick, quiet walk Luna reached her door and placed an ear to it.         “Victory tastes so sweet,” she heard Celestia giggle.         With curiosity in full control of her body, she opened the door as quietly as she could and held back a gasp at what she saw. Celestia, as bold as brass, was eating cookies that Luna knew were stolen. I should tell mummy… she thought.         As silently as she had opened the door, Luna closed it and began to head towards the stairs. When she went past her bedroom her stomach growled loudly again and she whimpered softly biting her lip. Looking back to Celestia’s door, then into her own bedroom, she saw the little flag she made a couple of months ago and looked back at her sister’s door with a determined look.         “I should tell mummy… but, I must liberate those poor cookies from the cruel tyranny of Sun Butt and for the New Woona Republic!” she declared with a wave of her hoof.         It was time for Operation: Cookie Liberation! “Alright, Fluffykins,” Luna started, “today is the day we launch Operation: Cookie Liberation!”         Luna was wearing a light grey body suit that had several darker straps wrapped around her legs and body, a greenish grey headband wrapped around her head. She looked down at Fluffykins who was now wearing a small helmet and a little flag.         “As some of you are unable to leave the grand Woona Republic due to family reasons,”         She looked over to see the other stuffed rabbit that looked like Fluffykins albeit with eyelashes and a pink body, beside it were two little rabbit plushes.         “I, your leader, will undergo this dangerous mission. For the glory of the Republic!”         Luna saluted Fluffykins before walking to the door and opening it with a creak, she poked her out making sure the coast was clear before dashing out and pressing her body against the wall. She shuffled along the wall carefully with a determined face close towards her sisters door. Once she had reached the door she again checked the coast to see if it was clear.         She tried to open the door with her magic, but Celestia had locked it before Luna had left her room. Grumbling to herself she peeked through the keyhole and could see the window in her sister’s room was open ajar and she grinned.         Luna took off like a flash down the hallway and towards one of the other windows. She managed to get it open and started to shimmy along the walls of the palace, ignoring the fact she was on a second floor ledge. Luna soon came to where her sisters window was and groaned in annoyance seeing it was now shut.         “Oh come on!” she cried. She smacked the wall with a hoof in annoyance. Letting out a loud squeal, Luna lost her balance and fell off the ledge. Celestia opened the window and peered outside, alerted by the strange squealing noise and tried to find a cause of it. Finding nothing, she shrugged and closed the window, not noticing the lower half of her sibling sticking out of the tree just below her window; her back legs flailing madly.         Luna grumbled as she sat in her room on her rump. She was trying to think of another plan of attack after the failure of the first one but had drawn a blank, the rumbling in her stomach not helping her concentration.         “Maybe a direct approach wasn’t such a smart move… maybe… maybe if I was more sneaky—”         She stopped mid sentence when she noticed in the corner of her room lying discarded, a simple box. As Luna continued to stare at the box a small grin that formed on her face began to grow wider and wider as a new plan formed into her head.         “Fluffykins, it’s time to commence Plan B!”         Luna held back the urge to giggle as she slowly shuffled down the hallway in the box. She soon came to Celestia’s door and pressed herself against the wall and waited for the right moment. Soon enough, Celestia emerged from her room and trotted down the hallway.         Luna quickly shuffled her way into the room just before the door fully closed, taking off her box and grinning at the prize ahead of her.         “Success!”         She was about to head over to it when she heard hoofsteps outside the door and began to panic. Placing the box back over her body, she quickly shuffled to one of the corners of the room, remaining as still as she could just as Celestia opened the door and re-entered her room. Luna held back her grumble of annoyance as she heard her sister start eating again.         ‘Maybe she’ll leave again soon...’ she thought to herself.         Luna could feel her eye twitching as her patience faded with each passing minute. She had been waiting for Celestia to leave the room for an hour and was slowly getting tired of it. Luna watched her sister through the slot in the box and glared as she watched her read a book lazily, the box of cookies sitting on her desk opened.         Come on… move already! she thought, at least this can’t get any worse... Her stomach growled loudly and her eyes went wide in surprise. She prayed that Celestia hadn’t heard her stomach growling, but by judging how her sister was now glaring at the box, Luna figured she had.         “Luna—” Celestia began.         “TACTICAL RETREAT!” Luna interrupted.         Luna scampered as fast as she could within her boxy outfit and out the door, just as a pillow flew overhead narrowly missing her.         “And stay out of my room!” Celestia shouted before slamming the door shut.         Luna grumbled as she sat on the edge of her bed, her front legs hugging Fluffykins as she pouted. She had run out of ideas on how to liberate the cookies from her sister and had given up, reluctantly waiting until dessert to have some cookies.         “I don’t know what else I can do, Fluffykins,” she sighed, “Both my brilliant plans have failed.”         There was a brief pause before Luna sighed, nodding her head.         “I agree, Fluffykins. I just don’t know what went wrong.”         There was another brief pause before Luna’s ears twitched.         “What’s that, Fluffykins? Somepony approaches?”         She looked up to see one of the night guard walk past her room. Immediately her face lit up upon recognising who it was.         “Mister Chives!”         The night guard stopped and backed up slightly to look into the fillies room, seeing Luna on the bed he gave a polite nod to her.         “Yes, your Highness?” he asked.         “I need your assistance…” she cackled.         The guard blinked for a moment, not liking the evil grin on Luna’s face.         “With… what, your Highness?”         “I want you to steal— I mean liberate Tia’s cookies!”         The guard looked at her with a blank expression and sighed to himself before walking away, having dealt with enough madness for one month.         “Mister Chives?” Luna cried,” Fine! I don’t need you! I can liberate them all by myself! Right Fluffykins?”         Fluffykins gave no real audible answer as the guard walked away, Luna turned her head away in a huff and spotted something in the corner of her room. Something that she and Celestia had each made for one another during one of their games, slowly another idea came to her mind. She looked from the item to Fluffykins, then back again before she smirked.         “Are you thinking what I’m thinking, Fluffykins?” she said.         She waited for a moment before slapping her face with a hoof.         “No, no, no. You need to think bigger, Fluffykins, outside of the box! Let me tell you my plan… the plan that will end all plans!”         Luna cackled as she pulled Fluffykins ear to her mouth and began to whisper her devious plan to him.         The hallway was quiet, not a single sound could be heard. In silence, Luna’s door opened and she stepped into the hallway. She was wearing a full black body suit with a face mask that left only her eyes, wings and horn exposed, dangling from a cloth belt was a long strand of rope as well as a plastic toy sword.         She crept her way over to Celestia’s door, carefully placing her ear to it and heard the sounds of Celestia eating still.         ‘Just how many does she have?’ Luna wondered, ‘no matter! They shall soon be liberated!’         As quietly as she could, she hovered into the air above her door. Steadying herself in the air, she focused all of her energy into her horn as she cast a spell on herself and inhaled deeply.         “Celly?” Luna called out, mimicking her mother’s voice perfectly, “can you come to the stairs please?”         Luna held her breath as she waited to see if Celestia would take the bait. She did.         “Okay, mum!”         Luna heard Celestia move something about, figuring she was hiding the box of cookies in a drawer before the door opened and Celestia trotted her way out, completely oblivious to the ninja filly flying above her. Luna grinned under her mask and quickly zipped inside as the door closed, deciding it wasn’t safe to land on the ground just incase Celestia figured out her plan. She flew over to the chandelier that took up the centre of her sister’s bedroom and carefully landed on it.         As she took the rope off her belt with her magic, she began to hum a little tune to herself. Tugging on the rope to make sure it was attached securely to the chandelier, she did the same to her own body and slowly began to descend to the floor using the rope, giggling in between her humming.         She stopped descending about halfway between the chandelier and floor and dangled for a moment like a giant, black spider. Luna flapped her wings, beginning to rock back and forwards, getting closer and closer to the desk with each swing. She grabbed onto it and cackled in glee as she slid open the drawer to reveal the box and lifted it out with her magic.         “Success!” she giggled.         Luna was too distracted by her triumph to notice the pink eyes glaring at her, anger filling them with each passing second.         Celestia hummed to herself as she headed towards the staircase, curious as to why her mother had called her but had figured it was her apologising for the cookie incident earlier. As she came to the stairs a sudden realisation dawned on her.         “Wait a minute… “ she muttered, “mum calls me Tia, not Celly… Only Luna calls me that whenever she’s…. upset… about…”         She trailed off and slowly turned her head back down the corridor towards her room, hearing somepony humming from within her room, recognising it instantly as her sister. With A nose she ran back to her room and slowly opened the door, blinking in slight confusion at the dangling filly before seeing her box in Luna’s hooves.         “Oh no you didn’t just try and steal my cookies!”         “Oh no you didn’t just try and steal my cookies!”         Luna’s eyes widened in alarm and she swung round on her rope to see Celestia’s pink eyes glaring at her, gritting her teeth in rage. The two siblings stared at one another for what seemed like an eternity, Luna slowly levitated out a cookie and held it in the air.         “Don’t even think about it…” Celestia hissed.         Luna smirked as she slowly levitated the cookie to her mouth.         “Don’t even think about eating that cookie.”         Luna slowly opened her mouth and lowered her head towards it.         “You wouldn’t dare...”         Luna bit into the cookie and began to chew on it, a smirk on her face.         “Oh you're dead…”         Before Luna could react, Celestia charged at her with a battle cry and tackled the dangling filly. Celestia had expected the rope to snap, but instead she and Luna began to swing violently and erratically as she clung to Luna trying to grab the cookie box forgetting about her magic.         “Give it back!” Celestia cried.         “No! I’m liberating them from you, Sun Butt!” Luna shot back         “What did you call me?”         “You heard me, Sun Butt!”         “Well you’re a Moon Butt!”         “Am not!”         “Are to!”         They continued to argue and swing, failing to hear the rope strain until it was too late. They tumbled to the ground as the rope snapped and Luna dropped the box. They stood up and glared at one another before Luna launched on of her sister’s pillows at her before starting to beat her with it. Celestia cried in surprise before retaliating with her own pillow as the two engaged in a full blown pillow fight.         They were so engaged in their pillow fight, they failed to notice a pony, who had been watching the spectacle, sneak into the room quietly, pick up the cookies and run out the room. Luna was the first to notice when she heard the sound of running hoofsteps and saw a mysterious pony in black run towards the stairs.         “Heeey! That pony has the cookies!” Luna cried.         “Lets get them!” Celestia shouted.         The two fillies charged after the cookie thief under a united banner, determined not to let their prize escape.         King Terra sighed in contentment as he sipped from his cup. He had just left the kitchen after acquiring some freshly made tea and was walking back to his office with a happy smile on his face. As he was sipping his tea he felt something rush past him at speed that nearly threw him off balance, he turned round just to see a pony in black dash round a corner and to the kitchens.         He blinked in confusion before his two daughters ran past him suddenly, staring in confusion as he tried to work out why his youngest was wearing a ninja outfit.         “After the cookie thief!”         “You won’t get away from us!”         Terra watched as they dashed after the figure and round the corner to the kitchens. He blinked again as he tried to comprehend what just happened, with curiosity, and some concern, he ran after the three towards the kitchen.         As the figure ran into the kitchen with the fillies in hot pursuit, it quickly levitated the box of cookies back onto a high shelf next to the one Celestia had tried to steal from earlier that day.         “You have no where to run now!” Celestia panted.         “Yeah, now surrender our cookies you—”         She stopped in mid sentence as the masked figure removed their hood, revealing their face to the two.         “M-mum?!” Luna squeaked. “But… but,” Celestia tried to say.         “Why did I take the cookies back?” Aeterna asked them.         The two fillies nodded.         “Well, I knew you had stolen these cookies the other day, Celestia, and I decided to retrieve them personally,” her mother glared at Celestia,         Celestia blushed and smiled sheepishly as Luna giggled before their mother turned her glare to her.         “And you young filly, why didn’t you come and tell me that Celestia had the cookies?”         “I was gunna but… I was hungry… and… I like cookies…” Luna looked down as she softly kicked the floor.         “Regardless, you two will have no dessert for the next week,” Aeterna said.         “Aww…” they both said in unison.         “But wait…” Luna started, “why are you dressed as a ninja?”         “What? Just because my daughters can, doesn’t mean I can’t,” Aeterna grinned.         The two fillies giggled as their mother scooped them into a hug which they happily returned.         “Does that mean we can play ninjas together?” Celestia asked.         “Of course Tia, now let’s go before—”         Aeterna stopped as her eyes widened in surprise. Luna and Celestia turned around to see what had surprised their mother before they both giggled at who she had seen. Terra stood in the doorway with a large grin on his face as he casually brought his cup of tea to his mouth and took a sip.         “Uh… hello sweetie,” Aeterna smiled sheepishly.         “Daughters?” Terra smirked.         “Yes, Daddy?” they giggled.         “Why is your mother dressed as a ninja?”          END