Chapter 1: Morning Cramps
Princess and Pauper
By ChaosMedler
Chapter 1: Morning Cramps
As the sparkling night began to dim and shift with the morning glow, Princess Luna looked to her sister, now waking to prepare for the day. “Dear sister, good morning.”
With sleepy eyes the white Alicorn stepped onto the porch and an eye of appreciation. “Thank you Luna, its wonderful that your back. The night was never my specialty.”
“Tis good to be back, for a long time you couldn’t get some of those constellations right… always at least a degree off.”
“Ah, yes… When my pupil came along to the observatory, she did criticize my astronomy. After that I couldn’t let a foul point out my mistakes…” chuckling, the long reigning monarch thought of Twilight and her time with friends. So free… “How was the night?”
“Clear, few clouds, the Pegasi have been doing a marvelous job; you look tired?”
At the question, Celestia only waved off the remark. “No need to worry, even if I had two hooves still in the bed I could raise the sun on time to the second. Now that I think about it, there’s an unusual windmill in Ponyville that acts very much like a clock. I’m not sure if its magic or somepony’s idea in place of a clock tower.” She would have to investigate that little peculiarity herself, no matter. “Well then, have a nice nap Luna.”
The younger sister herself yawned, not to wake up but to fall asleep, the night was hers and she had nurtured it well, now she looked forward to her nap. Not everypony was a morningpony.
As the darker coated mare stepped into the tower stairs, Celestia turned back to face the horizon of her (now shared) realm of Equestria. As she watched, she did not think of power, control or really something that was or remains ‘hers’, it was the land of ponykind, and for that she protected it. For a world a world filled with so many wonders, Celestia could only be reminded that it was all worth it. Even if she didn’t always have the chance to enjoy it fully…
“Well, the suns not going to raise itself,” She let the familiar swell of magic focus into her horn. Reaching out to the celestial body brimming with energy and lifted it up to her sights. As the horizons glow widened, so did her smile and then a sudden spark fried her mind. “AAAAAAAAH!” She crumpled to the floor in a body of agony.
From the stairs, the midnight Alicorn rushed back up the stairs. “THY SISTER,” the Royal Canterlot voice boomed from the tower. “WHAT IS WRONG?!”
“Stop… yelling.” The white Alicorn was trying to keep her head and ears from falling off. Seeing her sister ascend the stairs and fuss over her, she wobbled back onto her hooves. Shaking her head, she looked back to the sun only partially visible behind a line of mountains.
“SISTER—dear sister, thou has cried out, a most terrible noise.” She leaned in and around the white body and checked through the aurora mane; slightly, the colors were fluctuating. “We shall deal with the sun later, we will take you to your chambers—”
“Luna, I’m fine, just a… slip of the frequencies.” She tried to look ‘fine’ but Luna wasn’t the least bit satisfied. “I still have a ball of fire to raise, just watch me and you’ll see your older sibling is still her right self.” She smiled then turned back to the waiting vista. What was that? Celestia again brought to the fore of her mind the mass of magical energy, this time trying to mind that lash of pain. Growing, flowing and building into a spell burst, the Alicorn with her sister watching from the sides saw the sun once again rise… but slowly.
“Sister?”
“I’m… fine—” she said through clenched teeth, the agony was obvious but she kept on and on, until another spark flashed through her mind and face. Cringing on the spot, Luna leaped forward to catch her sister from crashing.
“You are not fine!” She then started tugging on her older sibling towards the stairs. “I’m taking you to bed!
“But, but, the sun—”
“We—I will deal with it later! Now stop struggling and bring your flank to bed! Before you break something!”
***
Groggily steering beneath her sheets, Celestia peered from the covers at the light trickling through the windows while a fire was flickering in the corner. Using the knee cap of her hooves, she rubbed at her horn now slightly black from the sparks and pain, maybe this was more then a simple matter. Trying again, she searched through the solar system and touch upon the sun again; doing so only reminded her of the beginning of her pains. Why! The sun was hers! It was her… no, the sun was not ‘hers’, but her responsibility. So what is a monarch to do when she couldn’t do one of her most important job?
A few knocks on the door alerted the princess of a visitor, the guards or her sister? “Come in,” she called out and then the door opened wide enough for a large pony’s head to peek in. “Luna… I appreciate your concern, but do I really need to be confined to bed in our own castle?”
The mistress of the night only looked on in bitter worry. “Dear sister, I’ve brought a visitor.” She was working on her choice of words, trying to ‘modernize’, supposedly to fit in with the ponies more.
“Is it Twilight?”
“Nope, a Doctor.”
Oh no, “Luna, you really didn’t have to—”
“Didn’t have to do what?” Another more condescending voice seeped from the door. Slipping in between the large carved doors and the deep blue Alicorn, an Earth pony trotted in with a bag and lab coat stamped with the red cross. Turning a bespectacled glance to the bed-ridden monarch, he looked pissed. “Princess Celestia, it is in both our interests that you don’t reject the ponies around you wishing your full health.” He settled his equipment on a nearby pedestal. “Now that I am here, I am doctor and you are my patient, is that clear?” he pointed a firm hoof at what was supposed to be his god.
Watching from the half open doors, Luna watched in shock of some pony talking that way to her sister; who was he? What kind of pony talks that way to royalty?
“Watch your tongue!” two steel-clad guards with good enough ears bolted into the royal chamber. “You are in the presence of the Princesses, you will cease your rude behavior or be detained—”
“Heel.” The Princess spoke down to the sentinels. “The both of you will stand watch; outside, never mind the doctors choice of words.”
“But…” one, a Pegasus turned from the resolute monarch and to the physician ignoring them. “But, your highness, his behavior can’t possibly be excused—”
“Are you assuming that I cannot deal with my own subjects?” She rose to sit high on her bed, appearing tall and majestic over the guards. “In my room, in my castle?” she asked the two guards for impossible answers. “If you feel the need to act in my defense, there is no need, my pride remains unhurt.” She relaxed her once sharp gaze as the guards took heed and carefully back out before something ugly befell them both. As the doors closed to leave the two Alicorns and Earth pony alone, the room was once again closed to but those invited.
Again, Luna was stunned this time by her sister’s reaction; she was always so motherly, not threatening. She could recall a few occasions before and after her banishment in which Celestia had stared daggers into someone. One was stoned, another flung to the ever reaches of Equestria and a few others who either ended up hospitalized or very very dead… Celestia was never a pretty sight when angry. She herself could testify to that to on one dark everlasting night a thousand years ago…
Brushing back a red mane, then shrugging off the sterile cloak, the doctor revealed a light blue hide with a cutie mark almost contradicting his profession. He sported a symbol of medical tools crossed over splatters of blood. “Now,” he began “How is my favorite patient who hates her doctors? I don’t get many chances to check your health.”
As if to laugh, Celestia scoffed. “I don’t hate doctor Hos, I just don’t like other ponies telling me how to treat myself.”
“Hos? Doctor Hos?” Luna looked from sibling to the pony she didn’t recognize; she was still trying to familiarize herself with most of the castles personal.
“Oh I don’t think we’ve met before,” He turned to Luna with a slight bow in his pose. “Maybe a passing in the hallways but I do believe this is our first real meeting. Let me introduce myself, I am Hospitaulx the 24th, Royal physician and surgeon. As you may have thought, the names old, a traditional name my family recycles ever so often enough.
So he did have some courtesy… or just not with Celestia? “Pleasure… I just don’t know many Earth Ponies working as doctors.”
“Yes, well its not easy, there’s a bit of a discrimination in the profession against non Unicorns. In this field, magic has been a factor in getting the job.”
“That’s terrible.”
“Well I can’t exactly argue against, magic has its uses but we ponies on the ground and above the clouds like to very much challenge that claim… and now I’m here, tending to Princess Celestia in place of Unicorns.” He sported a smile, a little pride shone from his eyes. “But part of me thinks my current position is impart to Celestia then to my cohorts.”
“Don’t say that,” the white Alicorn rose. “You’re a fine doctor and your company is much appreciated… unlike those other ponies.”
Luna felt curious. “What other ponies?”
“My competition?” Hos touched on memory lane. “Back when the health institution was looking for doctors to tend her,” he gestured his hoof. “Every pony jumped at the chance… except nobody was told the good Princess had an allergic reaction to doctors.”
“Allergic?”
“I don’t like doctors… too intrusive.” The monarch confessed. “And they worry too much.”
Hos smirked as if the admission was a big understatement. “I distinctly remember one cold winter you contracted a bug and wouldn’t let anypony touch you.”
“I was sick, tired and didn’t want to be bothered… so what if I refused treatment?”
“And used your Royal megaphone voice to ban everypony with a mind to help you from entering your room, unto-pain-of-death or something to that notion.” The middle-aged buck said with a touch of melancholy. “So everyone trying out for the prestigious position thought it best to heed your order or risk losing their medical license…. But I had other plans. I decided to do my job wither you liked it or not.”
“And then you snuck into my room and jabbed a needle it into my flank… I don’t like needles.” Celestia looked back at her sunny flank with a bit of a squeamish unsettlement.
“Yes, well, after you screamed, your guards rushed in and pummeled into paste, I thought I was going to be turned into glue.”
“They did have their orders… the captain at the time also thought you were some donkey assassin or something. So it was kinda understandable that the next day you were to be executed.”
“Fun times, almost got burned alive until you came and saved my flank. Felt like a witch burning or something.”
Luna watched, almost amazed by the bucks actions. “You disobeyed her orders? Why?”
“I told you,” the buck wore a smirk. “It’s my job.”
“And that’s why I chose you to be my royal physician, the ponies I want close by have to be competent… and be able to take their own initiative.”
“Well somepony has to stand up to crazy monarch orders; if not, then who else would answer to insanity with sanity?”
“Do you remember that day?”
“My unofficial inauguration? Beautiful day that was, smelling the pyre and watching sharpened pitchforks bob over the masses as Equestria came to see me struggle and blather mindless dying babble… and then you came soaring over Canterlot. Smothering the flames and cutting me lose, you gave a royal announcement to everyone that I was to be instead put-to-the-fork, I was to be promoted to your direct service. The look on everyponys faces is something I’ll never forget. You entrance was a bit late since the fires were already eating through half my tail… still, best day of my life.”
“Really?”
“Well, tied for the time I finally got my cutiemark,” he said with a blush. “I’ll tell you that story another time. So then, how is the horn?”
“Feels scratchy every time I try to touch the sun, it acts up. Feels like a headache.”
“But not just your head but the horn to?”
“Yes.”
“Hmmm…” he moved away from his patient to sift through his bag.
“Doctor,” the younger sibling trotted up to the doctor. “Do you have an idea of her condition, it doesn’t seem like an illness.”
“Its not, I think it’s something a little more expected.”
“Do you mean her age—?”
“I am not old…”
“No not age, merely exhaustion.” He flipped out a journal of pre-planned sticky tabs. “Its a horn burnout.”
“A what?” Luna asked, now more astute.
“Not the emotional sort, physical, like over stressing a muscle, overextension, your dear sister blew a fuse so to speak…” he turned to the Princess resting atop the bed. “And apparently this isn’t the first time you have had this conversation.” He marked in his journal compiling over a thousand years of nurse duty to the Princess.
Celestia only answered with a sigh. “One of my doctors about a hundred years ago talked about this possibility. I paid it no mind, I had my responsibilities to take care of, and still do.”
“Not anymore you don't.” He said with a level of finality that drew both Alicorns to a halt. “For over a thousand years you’ve been constantly raising the sun and the moon for the planet, a job I know to be a taxing one. I imagine the gig was meant for one Alicorn to one Celestial body, not two to one.”
The two nodded.
“For a thousand years you’ve done well to saddle the overwork but now the risks have caught up to you… quite timely I think.” He looked over his shoulder to Luna.
“You don’t mean—?”
“Yes, Princess Luna, for the time being, you are going to take over Celestia’s charge of the sun.”
“What?”
“No!” Celestia rose to her full height now enhanced by the bed acting as her podium. “I am your monarch, I can’t just quit and push my duties onto Luna.”
“She didn’t have to do anything while she was banished to the moon, you did well enough in her place raising and pulling the moon.”
“That’s different, I’ve had experience with the sun, compared to the moon closer and smaller, the job will be even more taxing for her.” She said her piece and fumed at request of her to step down.
“Luna,” Hos turned to her. “Today you raised the sun how was it?”
“…It,” She looked to her sister also waiting for that answer. “It was different… but not difficult.”
“Could you do it again, and tend to the moon also? If need be, maybe for another month?”
“I—” she saw her sisters eyes bore into her. “I—could,” and found her sister deflate. “But, but—If she just takes longer naps then will her headaches go away?”
“Go away? Just sticking a needle somewhere tender and the problem will go away.” Celestia winced on recall. “If it was a normal magic unrelated problem, then maybe. Except her headaches are celestial.” he snickered just as the two Alicorns looked down on the pun. “The point is, as of this moment, our fine Princess here needs to stop being a workaholic stop straining herself and share her burden instead of bottling it up until she snaps a nerve or blow her horn.” He turned back. “Celestia, you can’t ignore your situation.”
She didn’t look like she had given up. “I could just put you and your ‘diagnoses’ in a dungeon.”
“What dungeon, to my memory you never sent anything to any dungeon. I know that’s an empty threat, what other corner of the realm are you going to put me in?”
“There’s always the moon.”
“Uh,”
“Could she? Again? Without the Elements?” Luna looked from Alicorn to Doctor. “Its not a very lively place…. Too quiet, the only company I had was the moon and the rocks… they were my friends.” Luna thought back on ‘Stoney’ and ‘Meteor’ along with the ‘conversations’ she was able to make with the stars, you just had to listen.
Hos looked over his shoulder with a little worry and made a diagnosis, apparently Celestia wasn’t the only Alicorn he had to keep an eye on. “…I… don’t think she has the magical power…” He really didn’t want to be stuck up there.
“I have a cannon!” The queen of the bed blurted. “It will do the job for me!”
Mouth hanging, Hos didn’t know how to react to that or believe it for its implications. “…Fine! Send me to the moon, never mind your doctors best wishes. Stay in pain, what’s the worst that could happen? Oh, I don’t know, maybe an accidental solar flare that might just fry the face of the Earth, do you want to risk that?”
NO! Celestia bit back an outburst she would have regretted. “I can’t just—”
“Oh no, the Princess isn’t at her 100% Godliness and gets headaches like the rest of us.” Doctor Hos began to jump and bounce around the room. “Whatever shall we do! Shall we simply perish as our great monarch decides to share the weight of royalty?!” The Doctor melodramatically pointed a hoof to his Goddess. “Princess Celestia, as your humble physician, close-aid and caring friend, I ask you to take my advice… and take a break.”
Turning from the already spoken for buck, Celestia looked to her sister for some alternate opinion, but looking at her face already spelt out her answer. “The doctor is right,”
“…” She didn’t want to give up so she could do nothing but then she remembered this wasn’t the first time she rejected the concerns of her doctors. It took a needle to the flank to remind her that sometimes the better choice was the harder one. All she had to do was push her responsibilities onto somepony else. “…Fine, how long do I have to play neet and what can’t I do?”
Hos and Luna almost didn’t believe Celestia, but Hos was happy enough with a finally compliant patient. “Just don’t touch the sun, the moon or try any big fancy spells, its your horn and mind that needs time to unwind. Relax, think of this as vacation time… when was the last time you had a day off?”
“…After Luna's absence?” she noticed both their prying eyes. “Never.”
“Never?”
“Nope,”
“Never?"
“…”
“…Then I guess this is actually for the best,” the physician turned to gather his coat and bag of doctor’s tricks. “Other then my word, the rest will be your doing, I can’t stop you from wanting to continue your other duties but for anypony that hasn’t had a real break… well you need it.”
“I’ve relaxed, between my royal duties, I’ve had time to read and meet my pupil.”
“Reading a book and humoring your star pupil is one thing, but what about doing something for yourself?”
“Myself?”
“Yes, how about travel?”
“And have everypony in sight bow and canter to the very ground I walk on? Princesses can’t just trot around, it would never be a ‘normal’ outing.” That’s why I stopped having a ‘normal’ life…
He shrugged. “I don’t know, just try to find a way that won’t force you to shift planets around or carry the weight of Equestria. Low stress, you’ll find a way.” Just before the door, he turned to bow to the two princesses. “Until next time, your highnesses.” Giving one last smile, the Doctor Hospitaulx exited the room with two Alicorns alone.
“So,” Luna looked back at her deflated sister. “Your on vacation?”
“Apparently that’s the Doctor’s orders.” She turned in her seat and slump her head on a cushy edge. “Sick leave, can you believe it?”
“Not really, but after seeing you up at the tower this morning, I’m glad you wont be shrugging around the sun for awhile… that is if you plan to skip your work duties?”
“As someone that has lead Equestria for so long, my word has to mean something; I will have to stick to Hos’s request as best I can… Are you sure you can handle the sun? Because I can always give you some tips?”
“I’ll be fine, you’re the one who needs bed rest,” She headed for the chamber doors. “I’ll leave you to your royal slumber, have a nice sleep.”
Celestia watched her sister move towards the door and still felt guilty with her work now her sister’s shoulders. So what now, laze around, troll some blogs? Leavings not really an option, I’d stick out in public like a big white elephant with wings… “Wait!”
“Yes—Tia?” She spun around to her outreaching sister.
“You—you remember those spells we used to experiment… the ones we used to… slip out?”
“Tia, are you thinking what I’m—?”
“Yes Luna! It’s time to be young again!”
***
“Rainbow,” Twilight called after her friend backing away from a dangerous choice. “I told you, my recipes are Pegasus safe!”
“No thanks Twi, I’m quite happy not being the one test your funky magic spiced cooking.” She then jumped onto the express train’s roof. “Maybe next time, right now I need to make a trip to Fillydelphia, there’s a Daring Doo convention and I can’t miss it.” Jumping to the air, she looked back down. “I’ll be back tomorrow with swag! Later Twi!”
“Bye!” She said just as her friend once again became a rainbow blur. Stepping out of the way of ponies disembarking from the train cars, she looked back to the cargo containers now unloading an assortment of lab equipment. “Please be carful with that, most of it’s a gift from the Princess!” She rushed over and saw unicorn now stepping off the train steps. “Sorry!” She weaved around with a little help from her levitation. “Didn’t see you!”
“No problem,” The new arrival poked her head out of the door and followed by a bulging suitcase. “We all got something to rush to,” The unicorn’s eyes suddenly went wide at the lavender pony. “Twilight?”
“Oh hi…” she didn’t recognize this pearl white unicorn with long wavy pink hair, an acquaintance? “I’m sorry, have we met before?’
“…No, but I’ve heard of you, famous element bearer and Celestia’s star pupil. With associations like that, I’d be hard pressed to find anypony who hasn’t at least heard of you.”
A little red was seeping into the purple pony’s face, blushing? “I-I’m not that well known, so—ah, new in Ponyville?”
“Yep, just came from Canterlot and thought I could some travelling.”
“Well, have a nice stay—I said be careful with those!” Twilight rushed off to pester the ponies moving her gifts.
Looking back over her shoulder, the new pony in town held a small smirk to her pupil. She didn’t know. Celestia thought happily. If she can’t figure it was ‘me’, then nopony can. She continued hauling her luggage to the platform’s exit; to her, everything was new and nostalgic whither it be the everyday pony or rustic feel of being ‘ordinary’. Maybe this wasn’t so bad after all, she thought. Maybe now I can relax… and have a little fun of my own. She smiled as she continued on her journey not as a monarch, but the pony in town to see life in a different… perspective.
To be continued…
