And Hearts Will Change

Epilogue - Time Heals All

Celestia sat at the forefront of the large group of ponies, nestled in between her sister and the proud changeling queen, as she watched her student speak from behind a wooden podium. She had been to countless gatherings such as this in her long lifetime, many of which within the previous millennium, so none of this was new to her.

She glanced to her left, watching the somber expressions of her student's closest friends. Many of them had faced such circumstances in their lives as well. She could remember each instance perfectly as only a god-princess could. To her right sat her student's family. Her parents both wept, knowing the true meaning of the situation. Spike, her foster brother, showed little emotion; his tough outer appearance, however, was merely a facade. She could sense his troubled heart beats and the way he drew breath. Cadance and Shining Armor held each other, crying softly into the other's shoulder, unafraid to show how they felt.

Celestia looked to her sister who glanced back and offered a consoling smile. She knew her sister wasn't as emotionless as she portrayed herself to be. Later, when they were alone, she would weep Celestia would console her, but not now.

The solar diarch cast her goddess vision back to the remainder of the crowd, all of them friends or associates of Twilight and the queen. She could see several varying expressions amongst her subjects, many of them empathetic. Despite the tone of the event, there were still ponies chatting amongst themselves, heedless of the aggravated glares they were receiving. Celestia sighed, disappointed, but knew that she couldn't say anything to silence them. She didn't want to upset her little student.

Finally, she looked over the young queen, her face as expressionless as her sister's, yet her mood was given away by the trailing tears that rolled down her royal purple cheeks. She looks so much like her mothers. A build as powerful as Chrysalis, yet as soft as Twilight. Be strong, little one.

Celestia looked to the unicorn behind the podium and cast her gaze behind her. A large black coffin dominated the area, decorated with roses as white as the clouds overhead and topped with a picture. In the frame was a close-up of a black changeling sitting in front of Sugarcube Corner wearing a smile as wide as her muzzle would allow. Celestia could tell that the picture had been magically doctored. She knew. She had been there that day. It was missing several other participants, all of them present today, herself included.

I remember that day well. It wasn't long after Twilight had given birth, forty-two days to be exact, and she had asked all of her friends over to the library and sent an invitation for Luna and I as well. She had called us together to celebrate Chrysalis' first batch of eggs since her return to Ponyville. Those two were ecstatic. They had a beautiful filly, fresh into the world, and were expanding their family even more.

Everyone was happy for them and Pinkie Pie decided that a party was in order. Before it started, she had hired a photographer to capture that day forever and Twilight and Chrysalis were right in the middle of us all, their daughter wide-eyed with awe in their arms.

Celestia smiled brightly, tears burning her eyes and staining her cheeks as they wove trails down her face. She was proud to have helped raise such a wonderful pony and help them through a trying relationship. She was certain that that moment had been the pinnacle of their lives, the happiest day that they had ever known.

She finally replaced her sight upon her student, the beautiful mare that had been speaking her piece, dictating her eulogy with the broken sentences of a despairing wife. Celestia felt her heart throb as her student finally gave in and broke down into fitful sobs, unable to finish the heartfelt speech she had summoned from the depths of her being. She fell, wailing, to the ground and beat her hooves against the soil, screaming for the return of her lost love.

In seconds, the changeling that had sat at Celestia's side took her places beside her mother, holding her and weeping all the same. Celestia watched on, helpless in the face of such sorrow, and wept with them. She knew the pain that Twilight felt, and shared in the agony that the unicorn's parents felt. She had helped raise Twilight, been an important figure in the young mare's life, and regarded her as if she truly were a daughter.

The crowd watched on, all of the pair's friends, family, and acquaintances, as they unleashed their hearts upon the world and, soon, it was too much for Celestia to bear.

She stood and slowly walked over to where her student and her student's daughter had fallen, gazing tenderly at them and waiting for them to acknowledge her presence. She waited for Twilight to look up, for her bleary eyes to register who was standing before her, and then throw herself upon her mentor, screaming and crying.

Celestia knelt and pulled the young librarian, mother, and widow into her arms, leaving space for her daughter who accepted the embrace just as swiftly, and wrapped them in a protective cocoon of feathers. She did not move when she felt the heartbeats of the other Elements of Harmony, stayed still when Twilight's draconic ward joined in to embrace them from outside of the wings, and remained unfaltering when her family soon followed.

For a seeming eternity, the group stayed together, the center of the other attendees' attention, until Twilight Sparkle had no more tears to cry and her voice had gone hoarse. Celestia released her from the protective shell of wings and smiled down at the pony whose beautiful amethyst eyes stared back up at her. She watched as Twilight looked around, sniffling and hiccuping uncontrollably, to her friends and family, before cracking the faintest smile and nestling her head against the alicorn's powerful chest.

"Thank you...." Celestia nodded, incapable of finding words to express herself, a rare occurance for a pony thousands of years old. "W-hy did you have... to make to-today... so pretty? I-It hurts too much f-for today... to l-look like th-this."

"If it were raining, would you be happy? I find that days of beauty are best saved for such events. It is therapy, nature's way of consoling those that need it."

"Sh-she t-told me... that this w-would hap-pen. A long time a-ago. She told m-me and I cr-ied j-just like n-now...." Twilight sniffled and clung closer to her mentor, her alabaster pillar of support. "We did e-everythi-ng to ma-ke th-the most of our time.... I knew it w-would come..., but... it hurts so much. I feel s-so empty.... What am I s-supposed to do wi-without her?"

"Live, Twilight. She loved you with all of her heart, an amazing feat for a changeling that had only truly known herself until she met you. She shared her love, her life, with you and you shared yours with her. Together, you loved others, your friends and family, and together, your hearts became one." Celestia smiled brightly and stroked Twilight's unruly mane just as she had done when the unicorn was a filly and had hurt herself. "You gave birth to a wonderful daughter, the product of your conjoined love, and raised her into a fine, young mare. She'll need you, too. Chrysalis would never want you to forget her, so keep her memory close to your heart, but don't let her death hold you back. She would never approve of such an action."

Twilight giggled, a short, choked sound that was quickly swallowed by sniffles and hiccups. "I can almost hear her scolding me. Like when I had walked in on her during her laying.... She was so embarrassed, but...." Her sentence died as fond memories brought the pain right back to the surface, picking at the wound that hadn't even had time to begin scabbing over.

"You have your friends and family as well, along with my sister and I. You are not alone."

"Mommy, it'll be okay." Twilight looked to her daughter whose luminescent green eyes regarded her fondly from behind a soft, turquoise mane. "Mother will watch us from the Great Swarm. We'll always be with her, even if we can't hug her."

Twilight looked around herself again, to each of her friends as they smiled their support, to all of her family who offered their love, and, finally, to the princess who regarded her with a soothing smile. She felt her sorrow lessen, only by a fraction, but even that was more than enough, and allowed herself to truly smile for the first time in more than a week.

"Thank you, all of you." She pulled her daughter into a tight hug, focusing her world upon the young changeling and drowning out the background noise that was the funeral crowd, and kissed her softly upon her forehead. "We may not have Chrys, but we have each other. I love you, Imagie. Now and forever."

"I love you, too, Mommy."

fin.

~{A}~{H}~{W}~{C}~

Author's Notes: It has been an amazing ride, this one, and I thank all of you that read it and enjoyed it since the beginning, and all of you late bloomers that found this little tale. I hope that the story brought out the feels that I wanted it to and that it entertained you up to the last moments. I'll pause here to pre-empt a few possible questions. No, this doesn't take any inspiration from real-life events. It was just something I thought of one day and wanted to write. Yes, that ending had been planned from the beginning. Yes, changelings have a lower life expectancy than even my head-canon ponies reaching to approximately twenty years if they are well-fed (and queens) as compared to the forty of typical ponies. Swarmlings only live a few years (see three to five at best). Yes, Chrysalis died several years early at around the age of thirteen years. Remember that she had spent a long time being malnourished along with several stress factors weighing upon her early in life. Yes, Twilight will likely outlive her daughter, too, as she is roughly eighteen at the time of the ending. No, there were not any swarmlings because, by the time of the funeral, Chrys' children had died due to her being unable to keep her link with the hive mind and her body no longer capable of laying eggs, and Imagie (see Imago for naming) still hadn't taken control of the hive mind yet (her mother hadn't relinquished it until directly before her death). That's all I can think of, but if you have any more questions that I didn't answer above, be sure to leave a comment. Or, just leave your feels. Either one works for me. Anyhoof, see you, space cowpony! Peppy out!

Editor’s Notes: I feel that anything I say will just ruin the mood so... Hoped you all liked it. Ciao!