A Royal Secret

It was a typical morning in Equestria, except that it wasn't a typical morning. Celestia should have risen the sun at least two hours ago. That's what worried Luna the most; her sister was never late when it came to rising and lowering the sun.

She was heading towards her sister's chambers; praying that nothing had happened to her sister. When nopony responded to her knocking, Luna took that as full permission to invade her sister's privacy and enter the room.

When she entered, she found her sister laying on her bed. Her breathing was shallow and she wasn't responding to anything Luna did to get her to wake up. This was the time that Luna began to panic.

She scanned the room for something specific; it was an odd-shaped red hard case. Once she found it, she opened the case to reveal a needle. After prepping it, the night princess reluctantly injected the glucose into her sister.

"Bring my sister to the hospital wing immediately. It's urgent." She told the guards after calling for them.

As the guards did as ordered, Luna went to the throne room to announce that court would be canceled today and briefly explained that Celestia was not well this morning. She could only imagine what kind of crazy conspiracies the ponies would come up with, but that could wait until later. Right now, Luna had a letter to write to Twilight Sparkle.

"Twilight! Did you hear what's going on in Canterlot?" Rarity asked her friend as she entered the golden oaks library in Ponyville.

"No, what's happening?" The lavender unicorn asked.

"According to my friend Octavia, Princess Luna had to cancel court today because Celestia isn't well. Now, this part is just a rumor, but they say Princess Luna turned evil again and is planning on dethroning her sister. Amazing of rumors like that get created so quickly..." Rarity explained.

Just as Rarity finished her explanation, Spike came running with a scroll in his hand. This scroll was tied with a dark blue ribbon and had a crescent moon wax seal; it was from princess Luna.

"Is everything alright?" Rarity asked, seeing as her friend's face was full of panic.

"We need to get the girls back here; we're needed in Canterlot..." Twilight said as the two mares went to find their friends.

"Thank you so much for doing this, Cadence. I don't know how you and my sister can put up with all this...Besides, I need to work on the investigation." Luna said as a light pink alicorn with a tri-colored mane walked down the hallway towards the throne room.

"It's no trouble, auntie. I wonder exactly what happened to her, she's usually in control of it..." Cadence replied.

"I highly doubt it's her doing. I don't wish to alarm anypony, but I think this was an attempt at assassinating my sister." Luna replied.

"Your highness, the elements of harmony have arrived" a grey unicorn guard informed the princess of the night.

"Excellent. Please have somepony escort them to the library and inform them that I will be there as soon as I can." She said as he left to perform his orders.

"Now then, you will have to excuse me my dear niece, but I believe Dr.Blood Work wanted to speak with me. I wish you luck in court." She excused herself.

Once Luna arrived at the hospital wing of the castle, she was right away greeted by Dr. Blood Work

"Ah princess, thank you for coming." He said as the two entered his office to talk a bit more privately.

"Now then, your sister remains in a comatose state, but her blood sugar levels are rising at a decent pace. According to her test results, there was extremely high traces of insulin in her system; thing is, the insulin that we found in her was a lot more fast-acting than her prescription..." He explained.

"That's what I was afraid of..." She replied.

"Good news is, I'm estimating she should wake by this evening; tomorrow at the latest. We currently have glucose entering her bloodstream." He said.

"That's good to hear, thank-you doctor." Luna thanked.

"Oh, and your highness, when she does wake up, try to get her to take it easy for a couple days. Just so her system can recover a bit." He said.

"I will try my best, but you know Celestia; she is so stubborn..." Luna replied as the two laughed.

"I wonder what's happened that the princess wanted us...?" Rainbow Dash said as the girls waited for Princess Luna.

"I don't know, Rainbow; but I sure hope it's nothing too serious..." Rarity replied.

"Well, I'm just assuming that it has something to do with Celestia..." Pinkie Pie said.

"So Twilight, how much time did you spend in here?" Rainbow Dash asked.

"A lot. That's all I can say; a lot." Twilight replied as the six friends laughed.

"Sorry I'm late, Everypony. I had...huh...something urgent to attend to." Luna apologized as she entered the library.

"Princess, what's going on?" Twilight asked.

"Well, huh...how do I put this; now don't go around telling everypony, but I think someone might be trying to assassinate my sister." Luna explained.

"What? What makes you think somepony is trying to kill Princess Celestia?" Rarity asked. Luna sighed.

"There's something you should know about my sister; she's sick. She has type one diabetes." Luna said.

"Huh...princess, what exactly is that?" Asked Fluttershy. All six of them didn't quite understand what the disease was; not even Twilight seemed to understand.

"In simple terms, it's a disease which causes her blood sugar levels to be all over the place. That is caused by the pancreas malfunctioning and not producing the insulin the body needs to control the sugar levels." Luna explained much to the girls' amazement.

"Okay, but that still doesn't answer why you think someone planned an assassination attempt on the princess..." Pinkie Pie mentioned.

"Before coming here, I was in the hospital wing. My sister remains in a comatose state. From what I've been told, they found extremely high traces of insulin in her system. To top it, it isn't the same insulin as she normally takes; it's more rapid-acting- meaning it gets rid of the extra sugar a lot faster than the insulin she takes. Knowing my sister, she wouldn't be as irresponsible as to inject herself with the wrong medication and too much of it to boot. It just doesn't add up." Luna explained.

"That brings me to the reason why I wanted you six in Canterlot. If anypony can figure this out, it's you lot. I'd like for you to take part in the investigation." Luna continued.

"We would be honored, princess" Twilight replied after a few moments of consideration.

"Thank-you." The night princess thanked.

"Huh, Princess, I know it's none of my buisness, but huh, who is holding court at the moment if Celestia is in the hospital wing and you're here with us?" Fluttershy asked.

"Actually Princess Mi Amore Cadenza is currently taking care of it" Luna answered.

With that, the gang headed towards Celestia's bedchamber to search for clues. The first thing they checked was Celestia's nightstand drawer where Luna said she kept her medication. Inside the drawer, there was a bunch of needles, two insulin vials, alcohol swabs, a glucose meter and a bag of jellybeans. With her magic, Luna picked up the two vials and examined them.

"This is my sister's medication." She said placing the first vial on the nightstand.

"This is what was injected into her system." She continued as she handed the vial to Twilight.

"We should probably bring this in for analysis..." She said as the night goddess nodded.

"I never realized Princess Celestia had all these needles in her room though..." Twilight said.

"Why didn't she tell anypony she had such a condition?" Asked Rarity.

"She didn't feel the need to tell anypony...except for those who needed to be made aware." She replied.

"Ah kind of see her point, gals. Ah mean, Princess Celestia is more often than not the center of attention. Ah highly doubt she wants more attention on herself, especially over something like this." Applejack said.

"That's exactly it, Applejack." The princess of the night replied.

"Hey girls! Look what I found!" Pinkie exclaimed as she brought back a piece of purple fabric with light blue and yellow stars on it.

"Looks like it came off a cloak or something..." Rarity noted.

"There's only one pony I know of who wears anything with that pattern on it..." Rainbow Dash said.

"Trixie" the six exclaimed in unison.

"Princess, I think we should have the guards bring in Trixie Lulamoon for questioning." Twilight suggested as Luna nodded.

"I will give the order immediately. Twilight, may I speak to you in private for a moment?" she asked as the younger alicorn nodded.

As soon as Luna gave the guards the order to find Trixie and bring her to the castle for questioning, they went straight away. Once the guards left, Luna led Twilight to her bedchambers so they could speak privately. Almost instantly, Twilight gave Luna a hug.

"I've been waiting all day to do that" She said.

"Same here, my dear." Luna replied.

"It's unfortunate that it was under such horrible circumstances..." Twilight said.

"Don't worry, Twilight; we will find the one responsible for all of this...Are your friends aware of the truth yet?" She asked.

"No, not yet mother. I still don't know when to tell them..." Twilight replied.

"Well, I think you should tell them as soon as possible. Personally, I'd like to make it known to everypony about you and your cousin's lineage. We've been hiding it for so long..." The night goddess said as her daughter nodded in agreement.

"Maybe when everything is cleared up, we can talk to auntie Tia about it...?" Twilight suggested.

"I think that's an excellent idea. Now, what do you think about this whole thing?" Luna asked, referring to the coup on her sister.

"I think it's most likely an assassination attempt. Though narrowing it down to who might have done it, that is a bit more difficult. There are enough possibilities: it could be somepony on the inside of the castle, somepony who is close enough to her to know about her condition, or it could be someone on the outside, and this pony may not even know that auntie is a diabetic. It could be one of those, or it could be a mix of those things. It's hard to say who it could have been. Hopefully having Trixie in for questioning might help..." Twilight explained as Luna nodded in agreement.

With that, the two mares returned to the room to search for more clues. Twilight scanned the room when she noticed something.

"Mother-huh, I mean princess, I think I found something." Twilight said as she levitated a piece of shattered glass that was on the ground. There were a few traces of blood on it.

"This could be helpful...We will send it in for analysis and find out who's blood is on it. Twilight, did you check for remainders of magical traces?" She asked.

"Yes. I found a trace of unfamiliar magic, but I can't pin it to anypony..." She replied.

After perhaps another forty-five minutes of investigating, the six friends and the night princess called it a day. Princess Luna went off to raise the moon and discuss their findings with Cadence, while the six friends headed towards their rooms. Due to there only being three rooms available in the area that Luna wanted them to be in (meaning the same hallway as her and her sister's rooms) the girls had to share the rooms between them. Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie took the room further down the hall, Rarity and Applejack took the one directly beside them and Twilight and Rainbow Dash shared the room closest to the Princesses'. Once inside their room, Rainbow Dash grabbed Twilight and kissed her.

"I've been waiting all day to do that" she said.

"What are the odds that we would have to share a room while investigating what happened to the princess...?" Twilight asked.

"I guess we can call that luck" Rainbow said as she snuck another kiss from Twilight.

"I feel bad for not telling the others about us..." Twilight said.

"We'll tell them...eventually..." Rainbow replied.

"Dashie, they deserve to know...besides, we can't keep hiding our feelings like this forever..." Twilight said, a guilty look on her face.

"You alright Twi?" Rainbow Dash asked, concerned.

"Oh! Yeah, I'm fine. Perfectly fine." She replied.

Later on that night, Twilight snuck out of her room- unaware that her marefriend was still awake and watched her leave, wondering where she could be going- to go see her mother.

"Twilight? Are you alright?" Luna asked when her daughter came to see her.

"We have to tell them the truth. I want to tell my friends the truth tomorrow." She said, determination in her voice.

"I don't see why not." Luna replied. It was settled. Twilight would tell her friends the truth in the morning.