Later, much later, Celestia would chide herself for crying when Twilight Sparkle died.
Not because she thought it was no way for a ruler to act; she did not.
Not because she cared any less; she did not.
Not because her love for Twilight had faded over the years; it did not.
Celestia would chide herself because wishing it were otherwise remained the most selfish thought she had ever had.
Twilight was over three thousand years old when she passed, and had by all accounts experienced more than her fair share of what life had to offer. And yet it still cut deep when Celestia watched her start to fade away, deeper still when the news finally came, and heart-wrenchingly deepest at her student’s – her closest friend’s – funeral. It had been a grey, bleak afternoon, and as Celestia said the final words and the gathered crowd hung their heads, it began to rain. The Princess declined the umbrella proffered by her guard, instead letting the icy water cascade over her and matt her mane as all the other ponies began to rush for cover. The weather team had apologised for that, saying there was nothing they could do about the cold front. Celestia didn’t need to forgive them – she thought it sadly fitting.
After, the Princess locked herself away in her chambers for weeks. She didn’t speak to anyone, she refused all food. When at last her sister managed to coax her back into the world, Celestia’s chest clung against her ribs, and her lustrous mane had been reduced to a grey, wispy mess. It took months more for Celestia to regain her appearance, and even that remained nothing more than a mask, one she put on every morning.
Celestia had tried all she could to keep Twilight. Even her student’s ascension hadn’t been enough. Oh, it had bought her time, of course, which made it hurt all the more once she was gone. Twilight may have been an alicorn, but she wasn’t a true alicorn. Twilight was made, forged, not…
Not…
Not whatever Celestia and Luna were.
They had been there since the beginning, as useless a concept as the ‘beginning’ was. Much in the same way a pony couldn’t fathom the concept of existence before they were born, the universe itself couldn’t fathom the concept of existence before the sisters. In truth, they were one and the same. They were inevitable.
Celestia could still remember the Early Times. She had been heat, she had been fire. She had been countless suns, countless stars. She had been creation and she had been destruction and she had been light. And at the edges of everything she was, there was something else. Something different. Something she couldn’t ever be.
At the edges there had been darkness. Cold, ice, vast blackness. Far more than she, but easily overpowered. And at first, that was all she had done. She had spread, as far and as wide as she could, pushing back the Else, pushing back the Other, pushing back what she couldn’t even comprehend. Anything that wasn’t her.
And then, somehow, the Other spoke.
Well, perhaps that was anthropomorphising it too much. She had spent too long as a pony, and it had grown hard for Celestia to explain things as they truly were. Not in a language anyone other than she and Luna could understand, at least.
Because it was in that incomprehensible language, one born not of words but of emotion and feeling, of purest understanding, that Luna first talked to her sister.
Why?
It seemed a simple enquiry, but it was one that Celestia had no answer for. She had never had to explain herself before. Until that sentiment floated across the void, she simply was, and did. This was new, this was unknown.
It was exhilarating.
I do not know.
For aeons after, there was silence. Perhaps the Other had not been expecting a reply. Perhaps it had never been there at all. Celestia had no way of knowing. Not that time really mattered yet; there was no real means or need to measure it. There was no reason to care. And so the Light continued, pushing back the Dark. No matter how much she tried, there was always more of it, more Other. She didn’t know if it would ever end. She didn’t know if that mattered.
But eventually came another intimation from the Else.
I do not know either.
More time passed. How much is impossible to know, only that it was greater than comprehension, and yet insignificant. And in time, Celestia asked a question back.
What are you?
The Dark took even longer to answer this time.
I do not know.
I do not know either, the Light replied.
The war began to falter. Celestia was spread so thin, and the black was forever. She contented herself with smaller battles, no longer swallowing up the dark but merely existing within it. It did not speak to her again, and she didn’t speak to it.
And then it did, and what it said both terrified and excited her.
I have found something.
What?
Something that is not Us.
A third?
No. Something else. Something different.
Show me.
And the Other did.
Can it hear us? Celestia asked.
I do not believe so.
Can it talk?
I do not believe so.
Where is the rest of it?
This is all.
Celestia cradled the Something Else in her warmth and light, and it began to spread across the tiny rock it lay on.
What are you doing? asked the Other.
I am helping it.
Why?
Because I am.
The Other cradled the Something Else in its darkness and ice, and it died.
Oh.
Do not worry, Celestia said. I doubt it was important.
The Light was the next to find the Something Else, uncountable years later. Again, it clung desperately to an insignificant rock, and again it spread.
Are you going to help it? asked the Other.
Yes.
She gave the Something Else her warmth. It spread, it thrived, and then it burst into flame and died.
Oh, said Celestia.
Do not worry, said the Dark. I doubt it was important.
The third time, they were more careful. It still died, but it probably wasn’t important. The same happened a fourth, fifth, countless times. Each tried to help it, and each failed every time.
I have found it again, said the Dark.
Wait.
What?
Watch.
Celestia gave it her warmth. It thrived, it spread, but she knew it would die.
Now you, she said.
The Other gave the Something Else its dark. It pushed out the light, and the heat, and the Something Else did not die. Celestia waited, and before the cold could kill it, she gave it her warmth again. It did not die.
It is still here, said the Other.
Yes.
Should we keep it?
Yes.
The war, such as it was, was over. The sisters had new purpose now. Every day Celestia would create the sun and haul it into view, and every night Luna would smother it with her dark.
In the blink of an eye they watched the Something Else, the life, cover the world. They watched it become plants, and sea-dwellers. They watched the fish clamber out of the oceans onto the land, following the ever-spreading green. They watched the rise of magic, of demons and dragons and chaos. And once the animals grew complex enough to invent language, the sisters were no longer content to simply watch.
The sisters took form, became the alicorns they would remain for the rest of the world’s time. They banished the demons, imprisoned the chaos, shaped the world. Their already innate bond became whole as they worked, and it was in that time that Luna and Celestia truly became sisters, the only ones capable of understanding each other. And they talked to the Something Else, the Life, and now it could talk back.
The life fascinated them. It fascinated them because it could die, because in what felt like a single heartbeat to the sisters its time in the world was over, and it would never return. They did not understand it, the idea of death as incomprehensible to them as immortality was to the ponies. And they didn’t understand how the ponies could be so accepting of it.
The millennia drifted by. The world changed. Life came and went, as it always did. Celestia and Luna cared for it, guiding the world and what had become Equestria as best they could. There were mistakes, of course. When Luna returned after her thousand year banishment, she couldn’t believe how quickly she had been forgotten, and relegated to myth.
And it was shortly before that Celestia made her biggest mistake.
Twilight.
She had grown attached to ponies before, of course, it was unavoidable. And it always stung when they inevitably passed, but she had grown accustomed to it. At least, she had before Twilight.
It had seemed so unfair. Of all the lights of life, Twilight’s shone the brightest. She, more than anyone before, intrigued the Princess. Her abilities, her magical talent, her selflessness, her…
Her smile. Her eyes. The way she kept glancing sideways at Celestia when she was supposed to be absorbed in her study. The long, warm hugs she would give the monarch whenever she visited from Ponyville. The sound of her laughter.
Luna had warned Celestia. She had told the Princess how dangerous it was to grow too attached, that Celestia knew how it would end, and how she would feel. Celestia didn’t listen. She couldn’t. She wasn’t sure she knew what love was, that was better left to Life, and yet she was sure this was close. As close as she could ever get.
She did everything for Twilight she could. The elements, her ascension, all masked attempts to keep Twilight close for as long as possible. And yet, despite everything, Celestia couldn’t bring herself to tell Twilight. She didn’t know the words for it.
When inevitability caught up, she still didn’t.
And so yes, Celestia cried for her. She locked herself away, she cursed the Something Else, and she cried. For the first time, she knew what regret felt like. She had made mistakes in the past, yes, but never had she felt such an intense wish that she had done things differently, that she could have that time again. More than that, she wished Twilight had all the time she could. She wished Twilight would live forever, as Celestia knew she herself would.
Time rolled past, and the blur it already was became even less recognisable. The Princess took lovers, but she never fell in love again. It felt like they were gone too quickly for her to even learn their names, and in time she stopped asking. There were wars, and peace, and the tumultuous times in between. There was prosperity, and decline, and prosperity again, and above it all that impossible shadow of death that the sisters couldn’t understand but couldn’t ignore. Celestia grew cold, and the world with her. Something had changed, and her sister felt it too.
“Is this because of Twilight?” Luna had asked.
“I don’t think so,” Celestia replied. “It’s deeper than that.”
And it was.
Her sun became harder to raise. Her form became harder to keep. Luna found the same. Soon enough they could no longer remain, no matter how hard they tried, and they became the Light and the Dark again. They watched as the world they had spent so much time caring for crumbled away, and the Something Else withered and died like it had every time before it.
The sisters were different now. They had spent so long there that they had changed, that time had finally taken its toll on even them. They were both spread too thin. They faded until they were at the very brink of becoming nothingness, and there they remained.
Time lost its meaning once more, and they knew it would never have it again. They were one and the same now, sisters no longer, two halves joined to become one whole. They had nothing but themselves and their memory, or what that had become, and that was all. Forever.
It was then that the Universe chided itself. It was then that the Everything realised how foolish it had been. How selfish it was.
This was immortality. This was forever. This was the fate it had wished Twilight to share, and now it realised that it should have been wishing to share Twilight’s instead. The Something Else had been fleeting, yes, but now the Universe knew that was a blessing, not a curse. For the first time, it envied them. The shadow that the Universe had feared and despised was a gift, and one it would never receive.
We’ve made it to the end, the Universe thought to itself, the Light and Dark indistinguishable. There is nothing left.
No.
Why?
I do not know.
And now we sleep?
Yes.
The Universe thought for a while.
I’m not sure we know how.
Then we wait.
Forever?
Forever.
And the Universe waited.
Forever.
