The title refers to Celestia and some of the stories do revolve around her, but many of the stories go beyond those characters to focus on ideas/feelings/scenarios which I give a pony theme.
A series of very short stories of not much more than 500 words or so which tend to focus on ideas/feelings/scenarios and fit pony themes around them. The title refers to Celestia (Galaxia is her mother), and some of the stories do revolve around her, but many of the stories go beyond those characters and I enjoy writing for characters that seem under-appreciated in the fandom. The stories also range widely by setting/theme. They are often inspired by songs which I refer to in the descriptions of the stories.
A small white furred filly with a pink mane and tail gazes towards a large white mare who is nursing a dark-furred baby-foal. The large mare stops nursing to resume talking to the filly, "...and that's why it's called Spring, because when the sun returns life 'springs' out everwhere, from plants to ponies." she says. The filly nods attentively.
The large mare returns to nursing, shifting her weight a little.
In the lull the filly wrinkles her nose and inhales deeply, "Mmmm smells nice." The large mare chuckles sonorously before stating, "Spring is when the land takes its first breath after Winter - the scent of life's love for the sun."
Sunset grimaces internally as another pony steps past Celestia to greet her. Celestia had made it seem as though the gala would be impressive, but it was just a procession of pointless ponies.
Sunset wriggles her little pony flank irritably iside her shimmering cyan dress and steals a look back at it, admiring the way the flaming red/yellow sun appeared to illuminate the diaphanous fabric.
Her eyes flick forward to the latest mediocrity to say something meaningless to her. Sunset coos phatically back and, to her intense disappointment, is rewarded by a reasurring smile from her mentor.
Celestia had seemed so imposing at first. So important. But she wasn't. She was just as vacuous and empty as everypony else. She would rather fritter her time away on pointless socialising than achieve anything. But Sunset didn't need her anymore. She had found another place. A place where she wouldn't just be Celestia's little cheerleader.
Celestia gazes round the Castle of the Alicorns, the castle of their mother, not as it is now - a ruin of a ruin - but as it was then.
A sick feeling of dread builds as she climbs the steps to her mother's room. Luna is beside her, but she is silent, sullen, angry.
Next, they are in the room. Celestia sees it lying there. Celestia can't bear to look at the body. Instead her eyes are fixed on the familiar floor of her mother's room, across which Galaxia's long mane spreads.
"She can't!" Celestia hears Luna shout, her voice cracking, "Sister! She... can't."
Celestia clutches her sister's taut frame to her. "Let her go, my sister. It is time." she intones, just as her mother told her to. ... Celestia shudders back to reality. The little Purple unicorn filly had sparked the reverie by asking about her mother.
Celestia hesitates before giving a response, still upset from the waking dream. She blinks back a tear, and steadies herself. "Every road comes to an end little one. Everypony is on a journey and when that journey ends they rest."
The purple filly looks at her, closed, uncertain, for all the world as her sister did all those ages ago when she had said the same thing.
Novo gazed around the shimmering moonlit cave of her kingdom's only remaining freshwater garden. Her finned hooves clutched at the largest of the numerous white peace lillies as the still fresh memories of the lost press in on her, but this time she wasn't alone. "Now Skystar," she addressed her daughter, "I asked you to come to this place so I could tell you about our family, our real nature and why we live in the depths." Her daughter bobbed a sable coloured head, the large, intelligent blue eyes looking out at her, reminding her of another. "You father, King Maelstrom-"
"The lost chief." Skystar cut in. Novo winced and pressed the lilly she was holding to her heart - it hurt still to think of her lost lover here. "Yes, I come here to remember him and the others. Each lilly you see here represents someone whose story has ended." A look of shock and incomprehension from Skystar - the time of storms was little more than a rumour to her. "His story began at the height of mount Aris. You see little one, before the storms came our pride was such that we swam not in the safety of the still depths, but in the tumult of the air." Novo paused with emotion at the memory of the feeling of the heavy air against her powerful wings as she and Maelstrom flew together.
"H-how?" Skystar asked after a pause. Novo collected herself, "It is in our nature. He, I and you have the stormy sky in our veins. That is why you and I are drawn to forbidden surface places like this." she said simply. "It was only when your father and so many others became lost to the storm that I and a few others decided to foresake our pride and give up the skies." Novo did not tell her daughter that it was the young babe that was all that had stopped her joining Maelstrom. Nor did she tell her daughter that the name 'Skystar' bestowed when she was freshly grieving her loss, represented her hope to soar once again. Instead she contined, "The storm within us, which would drag us to our doom and end our story once and for all, can only be cooled by the magic in these waters." Even as she said the words, she knew her heart would always belong in part to the sky and longed for the day on which the clouds between herself and her love would be pierced and they would be reunited.
There is a time when the lights will arise (a Princess Amore story)
Princess Amore's little knees trembled a little as she clambered up the long flight of crystal stairs to the very top of the Crystal Palace Tower. This was not a time for playing mock jousts or making crystal accessories but she was now Old Enough to see mother Hyaline Quartz about her Royal Duty and Her Future and she knew this would be serious. The crystal filly was dressed in full ceremonial attire, including the ornate crystal broach - a yellow heart encased with blue - which she had received at the coming of age ceremony the day before.
At the apex of the crystal tower glowed the crystal heart, the priceless artifact of the crystal ponies which they celebrated at festival time. Next to the heart was the pink crystal form of her mother, her deep radiance magnified by the magic of the Heart. Amore saw that her mother was turned away from her, and as Amore neared she saw to her shock that her eyes were closed.
"Amore, why do you think we celebrate the Heart?" her mother began cryptically. Amore looked down, caught off guard and unsure of how to respond; she shuffled her peach hooves uncertainly. "Uh, isn't it because of the night?" she replied - in the crystal school and at the festival it was just assumed that it was good - that it kept out the darkness, but nothing she had read or heard ever really went into detail.
"No Amore; hate flees before love as night flees before the sunrise and that is good, but that is not why we celebrate it. The Crystal ponies of old worshipped the sun until they learned that it cared naught for their worship and that is why some of them listened to The Darkness." her mother replied.
"B-but t-then why do we celebrate the Heart?" Amore asked, feeling silly. Now Hyaline looked down at her filly, smiling encouragingly at the little one's diffidence, "I think you know Amore." Amore puzzled for a while and turned to the heart which seemed to blaze for a moment. "B-because it cares for us?" she wondered.
"In a sense. It is the stored love of the Crystal ponies for the light, not merely the light of the sun but the light of love that we all carry for one another ." Amore nooded, "Oh of course!" assuming in her foalish innocence that this was straightforward. "Amore, you must understand... not all crystal ponies give love to the heart - not even at the celebration." she paused to let the significance of this sink in. "Then why should we share it with them?" Amore asked incredulous at the idea of such strange behaviour. "Because the Crystal Princess is the glorious mother of the heart of the world." she replied - unsatisfactorily so Amore thought.
The helmet weighed heavily on Lavender Crystal's burly shoulders, chafing despite her smoothe crystal hide. Despite this pain she was glad for the helm which was a necessity if she was to resist the powerful mind-distorting magic of the Equestrian Oppressors and the malicious sorceress who led them. Lavender internally praised the noble Lord Sombra internally for his ingeniousness in devising such a marvellous device which could end the oppression and Free her forever from Tyranny. Lavender knew that Tyranny was Bad - an insult to be hurled at the enemy along with her magic and life if necessary. Lavender remembered that she had once attempted to argue that Tyranny was an idea and had even accused Lord Sombra of it! That was when Lord Sombra made her wear her helmet in order to stop the Equestrian oppressors using their magic to cloud her mind and make her use Tyranny as an idea rather than a weapon. Lavender was simpy glad that Tyranny would end when Oppression was ended, which would happen when the Equestrian Oppressors were no more.
Lord Sombra smiled as he withdrew his mind from his crystal lieutenant and once more marvelled that ponies had never unlocked the true power of the Crystal Heart as he had. As a creature of darkness he didn't fully understand why the Heart's message resonated so strongly with the Crystal ponies, but he certainly appreciated its results! His power flowed through the heart and was amplified by the Crystal helmets that each of his subjects wore, ensuring that they never deviated from his purpose. He was glad that the heart and the strange values of these ponies could be so easily corrupted, although it irked him that he couldn't so easily conquer the minds of the Equestrians who opposed him. That wouldn't matter, though, once he had won.
"I still think it looks nothing like me." Pink's piercing voice distracts me from my work once more.
"I've told you Pinks it's a plush. It's not a work of art. I think she did a great job on it. Honestly until I met you I thought that if you did suddenly pop into my world you'd look basically like that." I respond.
Pink, sitting on my bed, is squaring up to my large Pinkie plush and scowling. "But where are its hooves?" she objects; I recognise the beginning of one of her long litany of complaints about the 'inaccaracy of human perceptions of Equestrian ponies'.
"For the hundredth time, it looks like you don't have them. I dunno - maybe kids prefer you to be cuddly and cute not... hoofy." I (reluctantly) engage.
"But why do you think we'd be like that. You're not a kid!" she continues.
I look over at the scowling pink pony on my bed. Whatever she thought, she looked nothing like what passes for a pony on earth. About 3ft high, pouffy pink mane, fur covering her miniature pink hooves... She had more in common with the plush than she admitted.
"Well you don't look like any pony I've ever seen. Would you like to be enormous and brown?"
The only response I get is a tongue poke, which - to me - only makes her resemble the plush more.
"'ell me 'bout 'em 'ronies 'gain." Pink asks through a mouthful of toffee apple.
We're walking (well she's trotting) into the city centre to a pony-meet. After several breakfast-in-bed's, dozens of pinatas (which raises all sorts of questions I think) and general appeasing of Pink, I had finally persuaded her to meet other people who would 'get' her.
"They're like me - fans of the show." I explain.
"mph." she affirms, dismissively. Pink had a number of criticisms of her depiction througout the seasons. A number of times objecting that she 'wasn't even there' or 'would never do that'.
"But they don't think ponies are just like in the show."
"mph?" she queries.
"I mean they like to reimagine them you know. Some of the kiddy stuff doesn't appeal, liike you always say." I continue encouragingly.
"mph." she nods and, swallowing, her apple contines, "I think if I saw the show I'd be rooting for Tirek." she snipes.
I wince, Pink was great fun generally, but sometimes the differences between her and the Pinkie on the show could be jarring.
"But I'll be nice." she sighs, and looks at me meaningfully.
Sunset knew it was wrong to to read Flash's letter, but that didn't stop her.
'My body aches to feel your breath.' she read. 'I would be the one to hold you down.' Sunset's face, already crimson, colours a little more. '...and after, I'd wipe away the tears, just close your eyes...'
Sunset turns away from the page. 'Is it my fault that he's so obsessed with another pony? Should I tell him? Does he know what she is!?' she remonstrated with herself internally.
Her eyes flick up to the first, mesmerising, passage. 'My love, Your voice is trapped in in my mind, and the sight of you haunts my deams. I'm only happy when I sleep, because there nothing stands between us. I implore you, my love, would I spend forever here and not be satisfied?'
At length Fuchsia, an earth pony traveller, came to a lake. Exhausted by the long trot she enjoyed a horsish roll in the water to cool herself down and wash the dust out of her short fur. Once she was cool she began to take in her surroundings and saw that the lake was ringed by rounded river stones caked in a film of sediment.
As Fuchsia gazed at the water she was shocked to see movement far out into the mirrored length of the lake surface. Like an enthusiastic pony she immediately splashed into the shallows to take a closer look... but as the ripples quieted she saw nothing more. Disappointed she returned to the pebbled shore, only to realise that as soon as she had retreated the shape returned...
Fuchsia decided to stay out of the water and observe. Her large eyes were rewarded with lithe shapes swooping out the water, looking almost like ponies with 2 finned appendages and a long tail. Fuchsia's own tail wagged sympathetically as the balletic beings completed their dance and the large Equestrian sun slowly settled. It was with a start that Fuchsia realised it was already evening and she decided to sleep then and there beside the shore, swooping through the shallows in her dreams.
You walk into sweet a family scene. Queen Galaxia and Woona (a 6 year old Luna ) are nestled together on a chaise lounge, illuminated by lamp-light. Celestia is sitting dutifully on her haunches, looking at her mother intensely.
"They called my mother Sunburst a God because the ponies lived among the ruins of the Gods back then. The ancient ones had built large buildings to Her glory in the ruined lands, full of stern faces and beautiful stained glass." She smiles as you walk in, and gestures for you to sit beside Tia. "When your grandmother flew down to Earth, her magic ignited into a spectacular auroa, and they all bowed to her and called her the Great God Bird. They begged her to rescue them, and She did with the help of your grandfather Eclipse, although it cost them both their lives." the two young fillies gasp in shock and sadness."Anyway, when the scattered pony tribes arrived in Equestria they remembered the name, and it stuck."
"What about Eclipse!?" Woona cried indignantly. "Can't he be called a God Bird too?" she pouts.
Galaxia chuckles at the pouting filly. "All ponies love them both, but love for him is a quiet love they express by looking beyond the stars to his beautiful black coat." She sighs in the bittersweet knowledge that they would soon rejoin their Celestial Parents, knowing their immortality had faded after she had birthed her two beautiful daughters.
