On this particular night, Luna’s sky was laden with stars.
An innocent, intergalactic onlooker might be so foolish as to call it beautiful. That could not be further from the truth. These heavenly bodies weighed down the cosmos with the broken dreams of a kingdom long past; there were nothing but regrets sheltered here in this shattered world.
But even though it certainly was not beautiful, Luna reasoned, she could at least admire it for what it was—hers.
It was just too bad nopony was here to share it with her.
After all, it had been over four months since Luna had seen another living pony.
It had been well over six since she had last seen Twilight Sparkle.
…And it had been exactly twelve since she had last seen her beloved sister.
After a long pause, Luna heaved a heavy sigh. It did her no good to dwell on these things. She was a vagabond now—a nomad of the night in search of knowledge, following hopeless leads in a last-ditch attempt to bring the equine empire back to its former glory. The others had all long since given up on the cause, but Luna could never quit. She’d promised Celestia as much.
She couldn’t let Celestia down. Not again.
As she trudged down the well-worn path, Luna couldn’t help but notice that the Everfree was perfectly silent. The air was so frigid that she could see her own breath. A quick glance around reaffirmed that all the vegetation had long since wilted, and not a single sign of wildlife could be found either.
For a domain once characterized by chaos, never governed by the rules that the ponies’ world had obeyed, the juxtaposition was jarring. Luna didn’t mind, though. The eerie stillness proved to be a midnight lullaby fit for a place that fostered memories so painful as this one.
The trek through these woods had long since become self-fulfilling prophecy. Though she hadn’t walked these fallow grounds since her return from exile, the memories still leapt to life just as they had then. In her mind, she could just make out the four towers of the Castle of the Royal Pony Sisters piercing the sky far off in the distance. The closer she got, the more real the memory seemed. The shadows cast by her moonlight blurred into painted faces—faces belonging to ponies whom had long since felt the warm embrace of oblivion. They lined the path, trotting to wherever they were going without noticing her.
The memory of the Nightmare whispering sweet nothings into her ear, promising of her rise to the throne and Celestia’s fall, became all too real again. The ponies would love her, she recalled it saying. All she had to do was give in.
Luna shivered, skidding to a halt. Though the scene playing out in her mind wasn’t real, she could still distinctly remember each and every little thing she felt and thought on that dark day.
Wordlessly, she reaffirmed her pledge to never reach a place that low ever again. She wouldn’t cave in. She was stronger now. Smarter. And most importantly, she had a purpose.
It was funny, now that she thought about it. Back then, she’d thought that eternal night was what she wanted, that it would bring her all she desired. But now that she had it—certainly not of her own doing—all she wanted was to bathe in the warm daylight once again, or to see the bleeding sunset sink beneath the horizon one final time.
It had been exactly twelve months since she’d last seen the sun, and with each and every passing day, the night grew darker and colder. She had tried everything she could to right what had been wronged, but the damage was immutable. Luna was losing faith quickly; at this point, it seemed as though nothing short of a resurrection from the ether would bring on the dawn.
With a curt nod, silently and solemnly she resolved to do whatever it took.
As Luna neared her destination, the facade fell; the powerful, imposing castle that existed only in her memory faded to dust, leaving in its wake a pile of weathered rubble. She stopped on the far side of the long, rickety wooden bridge to soak in the scene before pressing onward.
What little was left of the structure was pitiful. Dilapidated walls and charred tapestries: she hardly recognized the place. There was no chance anything worth noting would be found here; this place was a dead end, inasmuch as her quest went. Even before her sister’s sun set for its last time, all of their worthwhile belongings had likely been pillaged or repurposed.
But if she were being honest, she’d known all along that she would find nothing of value here. No, she was here for another purpose entirely.
There, ten yards in front of the castle entrance, sat a marble gravestone.
Expression stoic, she willed herself to move forward. Eyes never leaving the stone, she trotted across the bridge. She stopped maybe three yards shy of it and fell back on her haunches. Time ticked onward—she continued staring at it unblinkingly, her heart sinking ever deeper into her chest. She’d long since lost the ability to cry, but had she not, she was sure the tears would be flowing from her eyes stronger than a river.
“I… I’m so sorry, Celestia,” Luna mouthed, lips moving but words inaudible. “I’m trying. I swear to the moon, I really am trying…”
Head hung low, she clenched her eyes shut, silently praying for some sort of solution. It had been far too long. Far, far too long. Luna’s little ponies deserved better than this. Her little ponies deserved better than her.
She sat there like that, unmoving, for what must’ve been an eternity. Lost somewhere in her own mind, she wandered, searching for some sort of answer that couldn’t be found.
Luna was so distracted that she hadn’t heard the approach of another somewhere off in the distance. The hoofsteps continually grew louder and louder as their owner crinkled through the piles of fallen leaves that lined the path. Then, once the stranger was close enough to hear Luna’s breathing, the movement stopped altogether.
“…Hey.”
Luna’s eyes shot open, but she didn’t dare turn around. “…Hello, Twilight Sparkle.”
The night fell silent once more, the quiet stretching ever thinner. Then: “You sure don’t make yourself easy to track down.”
Luna pursed her lips. “I promise that was never my intent.”
The words came out robotic, mechanical.
Reserved, even.
Slowly, Twilight closed the distance between them. Without ever looking at her, Twilight sat down next to Luna—not close enough for contact, but close enough that Luna could feel the warmth radiating from her body.
Luna turned her head slightly, glancing at Twilight for the first time.
In the fifteen years since her ascension, she’d grown considerably; she now stood only a few inches shy of Luna. Her wingspan must’ve doubled in size as well. Similarly, her mane had begun to transform—it looked silky and smooth, borderline ethereal. Part of Luna wanted to reach out and run her hoof through it, but she suppressed the urge.
All things considered, she’d fallen into her position as an alicorn princess rather nicely. The transition had always been a slow one, but she’d taken it all in stride so far.
But beyond all of that, what really stuck out at her were Twilight’s eyes, bloodshot and puffy. Her jaw remained clenched tightly, a natural defence against the brutality of the wasteland.
For the first time, it dawned on Luna that maybe she wasn’t the only one hurting.
…As terrible as it was, the thought gave her a strange sense of comfort.
“Hard to believe that it’s already been a whole year.”
Luna nodded once. “It does feel like it all happened only yesterday.”
Biting her tongue, Luna turned her gaze skyward. She locked her eyes on the spot where the sun had once been. There, lost somewhere within the void, sat a black hole, the remnants of a cataclysm that had torn apart the world as they had known it.
If she closed her eyes tightly enough, she could still see it all unfolding—the brilliantly terrifying blast of the supernova, the pulse of raw energy as it tore through space and time toward their helpless planet, the expression of raw pain on Celestia’s face as the light drained from her eyes…
She’d warned them a few weeks beforehand that something had felt wrong, but nopony had expected this. Who would?
In a final attempt to save her little ponies, she’d thrown all of her magic and then some against the oncoming supernova—it half-worked. According to the mathematicians, the casualties had only been a fraction of what they should’ve been.
Celestia had been one of them.
As the sun had died, she’d fallen with it. Yet somehow, even in her last moments, she’d put the well-being of others before herself. She had saved hundreds of thousands of lives that day.
The silence, brittle as ever, finally shattered.
“I’ve been trying to find you for five months now, you know.” Twilight’s tone was monotonous, matter-of-fact. It certainly didn’t take the sting out of the words, though.
“Oh?” Luna replied, playing dumb.
“Where have you been all this time?” There was a hitch in Twilight’s voice now. Her tone was rising.
“Searching.”
No reply came. Luna took this as a sign to continue.
Her gaze turned back forward, looking off somewhere in the distance. “I have found nothing yet, but I will not give up until I do. I swear upon it.”
“Luna, I—”
Luna’s head whipped toward Twilight. “Oh, save it!” she interrupted, her voice cracking up an octave or two. “I made a promise! I promised them that I would not come back until I could bring back Celestia’s sun!”
Her ears splayed. Much quieter, barely more than a whisper, Luna added, “…I do not intend to break that promise… not now, nor ever.”
“You could’ve been dead for all we knew!” Twilight fired back, face now mere inches from Luna’s. “It’s been months since anypony has even seen you! What if something terrible happened and you needed help out here, but there was nopony. What then?”
Jaw clenched, Luna muttered, “I think I can handle myself just fine, Twilight Sparkle.”
A pause, then a deep breath. Twilight continued, “They need you as a leader. A symbol of hope.”
“They’ve got you and Cadance,” Luna spat. “What do they need me for?”
Twilight stomped a hoof, kicking a cloud of dust into the air. “You think the two of us know what we’re doing? We’re just placeholders. They need to see you. You’re older, wiser. Once you let them know everything is alright, everything will be fine again.”
“But everything is not alright!” Luna shouted. “How can I reassure them when I am not reassured myself? I refuse to lie to them.”
Twilight’s frown deepened. “You don’t have to know what you’re doing to lead. Your presence is what’s comforting to them… to us.”
Luna could feel a lump forming in her throat. She didn’t dare speak.
“We all miss you, Luna.”
A second ticked by. Then another. And another. Suddenly, Twilight’s gaze fell to the ground, head hung low.
Barely audible, she murmured, “…I miss you.”
At last, the dam broke. The river poured freely from Luna’s eyes for the first time in what felt like centuries; her tears said more than her words ever could.
Twilight looked up at her, staring into her eyes. Bravely, she offered a shaky smile through her own tears.
They sat there like that, perfectly silent, staring at one another.
Abruptly, Luna darted forward, pulling Twilight into the biggest, tightest embrace she could. Twilight hugged her back just as tightly. Luna no longer made an effort to fight back the sobs wracking her body, letting it all out. She hid in the warmth of their embrace, a warmth that valiantly fought back the bitter cold of the night.
Impossibly, in that one instant, she found a moment of solace.
Head resting on Twilight’s shoulder, she choked out the words, “It is so lonely out here…”
Twilight gave her another squeeze. “Then come back home with me. Come live with us in the geothermal shelters—the engineers say they’ll last another millennium at the least. The freezing of the planet won’t reach us down beneath the core of the earth for a long, long time.”
Luna paused. “That place may be your home, but it is certainly not mine. I would not feel right there.”
“At least try?” Twilight pleaded. “For me?”
Luna took a deep breath to calm herself down, still never letting go of Twilight. “We… we are both immortal. What happens once that millennium is up? We live alone on this empty planet? No, I must keep searching for a solution. I need to bring back Celestia’s sun. I promised them all those months ago. I promised Celestia. I will find a way.”
“The scientists are working on a solution. You can help them instead. You don’t need to be doing this out here all alone.”
Luna shifted her weight from side to side. “But… the planet freezing over is not our only problem. What about the black hole? The council of unicorn elders may be able to restrain its gravitational pull for now, but they cannot hold it back forever.”
Twilight pulled away from their embrace—Luna shivered immediately, now distinctly aware of just how cold it was. “That may be, but how are you going to do anything about it by yourself?”
“I will turn the black hole back into Celestia’s sun,” Luna said, expression deadpan and voice feeble. “I do not yet know how, but I will find a way. I will physically turn back time if I need to; there has to be some sort of hidden magic that will help. I swear on the moon and the stars, I will bring back Celestia’s sun.”
“We can all help you with—”
“I am stronger now,” Luna interjected, muscles tensed. “I promised them I would do it on my own. I… I can do it on my own.” Quietly, she added, “I’m stronger than I was then…”
Realization spread across Twilight’s face. “Is… is that what this is about? Luna, you are stronger than you were a thousand years ago. But… asking for help isn’t the same as admitting weakness. You don’t have to go it alone. Let us help you. Let me help you.”
Luna’s ears fell. After a moment of deafening silence, she let out a long, defeated sigh. “I… I should go. Hopefully we will cross paths again soon, Twilight Sparkle.”
Luna stopped, waiting for her to object. The words never came—Twilight simply sat there staring through her, eyes glazed over.
Silently, Luna clambered to her hooves. After sparing Twilight one more sidelong glance, she began the trek down the moonlit path through the Everfree Forest.
Just as she reached the edge of the bridge a few meters away, Twilight’s voice cut through the air. “Wait.”
Luna looked back over her shoulder expectantly.
Twilight stood stark still, staring straight at Luna. “I’m coming with you.”
“W-what?”
“You heard me,” Twilight said, a bit more confidence behind her words this time. “I’m coming with you.”
“Twilight, I told you—”
She shot Luna a glare. “I’m not asking you, I’m telling you.” She trotted over to Luna, pointing a hoof in her face. “You don’t have a say in this—I am coming with you.”
“But what about the—”
“Cadance is more than capable of leading them,” Twilight said, “especially with Shiny and the girls with her. If you won’t come back with me, then I’m going to stay out here with you. I refuse to leave you alone again.”
“Twilight, I don’t—” After seeing the look on Twilight’s face, Luna simply let the thought trail off. Instead, she mumbled the words, “…A-are you sure?”
In lieu of a response, Twilight leaned in and nuzzled Luna.
A smile slowly crept across Luna’s face as she returned the nuzzle. Was it selfish? Maybe, but she couldn’t bring herself to care. The thought of having Twilight by her side reassured her—with the both of them together, she had no doubts that they would find a way to save their helpless planet and the equines that resided on it.
She was stronger now than she had been all those years ago—but even the mightiest of warriors need an army behind them.
Twilight looked at Luna, then panned her gaze over to the path. With a smile—a genuine smile—Luna nodded in assent.
And just like that, the duo disappeared into the night in search of a greater dawn.
