It was a few hours before the date, and Celestia was slowly become a wreck with nerves. She was fortunate that her niece was still down from the Crystal Empire, which had distracted her for the past few days, but now all the attention had switched to the evening.

Celestia found herself in her bedroom along with Luna and Cadence. How they ended up there she wasn’t sure as she didn’t need any help getting ready for the evening...she wasn’t thinking of doing anything special for her trip to ponyville.

“So, what are you planning on wearing tonight?” Cadence asked as she trotted over to her Aunts wardrobe, opening it up without asking and looking at the dresses inside.

Celestia was a little taken back but the forwardness of Cadence, having not had any ponies be so bold with her for a long time. “Wear? I wasn’t planning on wearing anything tonight except my usual regalia.”

Cadence turned round in shock “Oh, but you must - A nice dress is an important part of the date!”

Celestia sighed “I don’t do the whole clothes thing. I’ve only worn a dress for yours and Twilights Coronations, and that was by law! I didn’t even put on a dress for your wedding.”

“That doesn’t mean anything!” Cadence rolled her eyes slightly “I know as Princesses you and Luna choose to go against the norm of wearing outfits for the Grand Galloping Gala and so forth. But this is dating...there is an expectation of clothing.”

“But why? Given we’re, you know, nude all of the time, why do we dress up to attract a mate?” Celestia asked her young niece. Whilst Celestia may have been much older than either of the two other alicorns in the room, she knew the princesses of love and night had more intimate knowledge when it came to romance and the more intimate areas of relationships.

“By covering up, we put a barrier between ourselves and our date. Then, as the relationship progresses, eventually those barriers come down. Its a way of showing the progression of intimacy without having to actually talk about it...and before we get to the really nice stuff” Cadences eyes glazed over for a few seconds as she thought about her husband back home running the Crystal Empire whilst she was in Canterlot.

“That...makes a surprising amount of sense” Celestia mused.

“So, socks?” her sister giggled. Celestia took the socks that Luna was floating in front of her face and threw them with her magic into the darker alicorns face.

“So, no socks then!” Luna continued to giggle at her elder sisters embarrassment “Or not until you let Discord undress you! I wonder if he uses magic or those freaky fingers he has?”

Celestia picked up all the cushions and pillows in her room in her aura and chucked them all simultaneously at Luna. The night goddess simply let them hit her as she rolled on the floor with laughter, until she was pinned down by the weight.

“Luna!” Cadence scolded her other aunt “Thats not very nice. This is all new to your sister and we're here to support her. Now if socks embarrass her, lets not make a big deal out of it!”

“Why do you have these items then Tia if you don’t wish to wear them” Luna smirked as she struggled to pull herself out of the large pile of cushions that had been dumped on her.

Celestia cheeks showed the faintest hint of a blush “Hey...we all like to feel sexy sometimes!” and with that the largest alicorn turned her eyes down to the ground “Given none of our subjects seem to find me attractive, I just...you know...like to dress up a bit…”

Luna looked at her sister with genuine surprise “None of our subjects find you attractive? You're kidding right? You do know how you are revered by our subjects?”

The blank look on Celestias face told Luna that this was new news to our sister. “Really, you didn’t know that our guards worship us? And not as goddesses but as mares!” .

“They do?” the elder sister asked with a bit of shock “But, they are always so stuffy around us!”

“They are just being professional, but they dream about us...often! And probably would Cadence as well but they know shes married to the captain of the guard.”

Celestia’s blush intensified a bit, and with a lot of guilt Luna went over and nuzzled up to her “Sister, I did not mean to embarrass you so, but I thought you knew!” and the sisters shared an embrace.”I would not have teased so if I thought you wasn’t aware of just what our little ponies thought of us...I’m sorry.”

Cadence coughed a bit to get their attention and try to move away from the awkwardness “Okay, with that out of the way, what dress do you like best?”

Celestia looked through the dresses in her wardrobe, holding a few up against her body and switching them around like any other mare in a clothes shop. She finally finished on a simple, yet elegant, dream coloured dream with a black trim.

“Okay, I’m not joking this time, but these really match that outfit!” Luna spoke sincerely as levitated something over to her sister.

“Stockings? Doesn’t that make me look a little...i don’t know...a little gothic?” Celestia raised an eyebrow at her sister.

“It’s all the rage right now...I think it’s meant as a nice homage to yours truly” Luna smiled, but warmly rather than the teasing she had been giving her elder sister earlier “Besides, given that dress, like all of them, are a little dated it will match quite nicely.”

Celestia looked over the dresses, noting she had nothing new commissioned since the turn of the century...the previous century “Don’t you think that’ll make me look a bit old?”

“Tia, Discord is older than us and knows how old we all are...it’s not a problem.”

Cadence looked over her aunts head “And we really must do something with your mane...don’t get me wrong I would love an ethereal mane like you two, but it’s not very subtle for a date. Perhaps we could get it up somehow?“

Celestia looked into the mirror, imagining what it would be like her mane “What about my crown?”

“You’ll leave that in the castle silly?”

“Wait, go out without a crown?”

Yes!” Cadence practically facehoofed “And your chestplate and regular shoes as well. You have some nice shoes here that match your outfit!”

Celestia recoiled a little in shock “Go out without my crown...I’m not sure about that”

“Do you want Discord to be dating Princess Celestia” Luna pronounced the name as formally as she could “or the mare Celestia?” Luna spoke seductively..

Celestia looked at both her fellow princesses, at the dress in her aura and sighed in defeat “Okay, you win!”

“Goodie” Luna clopped her hooves “Cadence, you start on the mane, I’ll get the make-up!”

Author's Note

This is sort of an interesting chapter when it comes to the Bechdel test as such. We haven’t seen Celestia or Luna being very feminine (We have Cadence) so it was weird to think that Celestia might want to be that way sometimes...as well as a strong leader.

And gothic celestia because that toy canon now!