We stand together

It was a dark, autumn night, the sky was cloudless and starry. The ponies of ponyville had taken this as a perfect opportunity to stargaze. The six ponies who held the elements of harmony sat together, staring up at the twinkling sky.

‘Isn’t it wonderful?’ said Fluttershy dreamily, the other ponies nodded in unison.

‘It makes you wonder whether Nightmare Moon had a point...’ started Rainbow dash, but that received a lot of strange looks from the ponies sat on the hill ‘Hey I was just messin’ with ya!’ she said quickly in her defence.

‘That’s not a thing to “mess” about Rainbow’ said Twilight.

‘Yeah! That crazy pony damn nearly put the land into eternal night!’ butted in Applejack.

Twilight sighed and looked back up on the stars, ‘I wonder if there’s anypony else up there’ She thought, ‘looking back down on us...’

As if on cue, a huge explosion appeared in the sky, in the middle of the Orion constellation, and shot out what appeared to be shooting stars everywhere.

‘What in the hay!?’ yelled Applejack, ‘Twi what was that?’

Before Twilight could answer though, one of the comet-like chunks of whatever exploded turned in midair and started screaming towards them.

‘Look out!’ She screamed, but it was too late, everything went white...

~

When Twilight awoke, she was in the hospital wing of the castle in Canterlot, but there were white curtains thrown around her bed. She tried to call out but couldn’t seem to find her voice, all that came out was a weak splutter. Obviously this was heard though and a nurse came rushing to her side,

‘Princess!’ She began in relief, ‘Your student! She’s awake!’.

Twilight heard a rustling sound and Princess Celestia came through the curtain and stood beside her bed, she could see that she had been crying.

‘Twilight!’ She exclaimed in obvious relief, this was strange because Celestia almost always referred to her as ‘My faithful student’ but Twilight didn’t mind, ‘You’re alright!’.

She bent over and nuzzled her gently, a magical warmth spread through her body as she did this. After a while of hugging, Twilight finally found her voice,

‘My... Friends?’ she spluttered, clearly making a great effort to speak.

‘They are OK’ Celestia assured her, ‘But...’ she hesitated for a second.

Twilight managed to ask a faint ‘What?’ but Celestia still looked unsure.

‘Are you sure you’ll be alright with any news I give you in this state? Don’t say,’ she said as she tried began to splutter and wheeze, ‘Just nod or shake your head’ Twilight nodded as vigorously as she could manage. ‘Very well...’ She began, ‘You and your friends weren’t the only ones found in that crater.’

Twilight was stunned, they were sitting well away from any other ponies that night, Celestia obviously saw this and put her hoof on her shoulder. ‘Don’t worry about it for now, we’ve got it all handled.’ And with that, she walked away.