Twin Twilight Tales

by MagnetBolt

Rating: teen
Tags: Sunset Shimmer, Twilight Sparkle (EqG), Princess Celestia, Slice of Life, Alternate Universe, Twilight Sparkle, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Princess Cadance
Length: 159425

Sunset Shimmer has made a small mistake. That mistake is purple, short, and asks a lot of tricky questions.

When magic goes wrong, it can have disastrous results. For example, you might end up with two fillies when you only expected one.

An episodic tale about motherhood, two diverging lives, and reckless use of incredibly powerful magic by everypony involved.

Cover art by AmpDragoness

Teen rating for more blood in one or two later chapters than they'd allow on the show. Better safe than sorry.

Published 2018-05-13 15:50:06 UTC
Last updated 2018-07-12 15:31:29 UTC

Chapter 1

Sunset groaned and rolled over, not daring to open her eyes. She could feel that she was on a thin mattress, covered with a scratchy blanket. Probably a dungeon. She deserved it and she knew it. Not for the filly thing - that wasn’t her fault - but definitely for breaking a magical artifact, defying direct orders from Princess Celestia, and circumventing the castle wards.

She was sure at least one of those was a crime. She wasn’t sure which. But she’d just had to shoot for the moon and spread herself out enough that she’d been guaranteed to commit at least one or two crimes worth imprisoning her for.

“I hope I get more than bread and water in the royal dungeon…” Sunset muttered.

“Unfortunately, hospital food is worse,” said a calm, commanding voice that made Sunset’s eyes snap open. Celestia was sitting next to her bed, looking with the deep remorse of an immortal discovering a new depth to which mortals could sink. This gaze was not directed at her student, but at a cup of tea clutched in her magic. “I think these tea leaves have been used before, and I’m a princess. I hate to think of what they serve the normal patients.”

A crowd of excuses and explanations formed in Sunset's mind, leaving her speechless until panic shoved to the forefront and took over Sunset's mouth, grabbing a hoofful of denial and throwing it out there. “Look, I don’t know what the guards said, but I-”

“Calm down, Sunset,” Celestia sighed. “I’m not going to throw you into the dungeons."

Sunset still looked worried.

"Or into the street," Celestia specified. Her student relaxed, and to make sure she didn't relax too much, the alicorn finished with a firm "Yet."

Sunset looked down at her hooves. Or the hospital bed, at least. The scratchy blanket covered her hooves, so she was looking at that, instead.

“I do, however, expect a formal apology for breaking my rules, and as punishment you’re going to spend the next few days determining exactly what you did to the mirror and that filly.”

“Who was she?” Sunset asked. It took a few seconds to remember the other question to ask. “Is she okay?”

“At least you’re worried about her." Though Celestia suspected it was more polite than worried, and only even that because Sunset was in too much trouble to get away with being impolite. “Her name is Twilight Sparkle. Apparently, she is the little sister of one of the Guard recruits being trained in the castle."

“I didn't hurt her, right?” Sunset was pretty sure they wouldn't be having a polite conversation if it was the case, but it didn't hurt to ask.

“A little shaken up but otherwise healthy, by all accounts. Princess Cadance is taking her home. Now, let’s talk about that book you had and the spell you were trying to use…” Celestia’s gaze hardened, and Sunset groaned, lifting the sheet up to hide her face.

The Princess' disappointment was even worse than being yelled at.

Cadance was used to Twilight’s panic attacks and how to deal with them. This was good, because right now the filly was having the biggest, most explosive tantrum and panic attack she’d ever seen.

Literally explosive, in the case of the small fireball the filly had fired off. That had managed to set a guard’s tail on fire. He wasn’t hurt, but he’d have a rather ugly bob cut for a while. The spark had only managed to make Twilight panic even more, like she’d never set something on fire before (it was such a common occurance that the Sparkles had their own direct line to the fire department).

Twilight was currently catatonic with terror, which was something of a blessing since it made carrying her much easier. Even with her telekinesis backed by alicorn magic, the filly was very capable of slipping out of Cadance's grasp when she really wanted to.

“Don’t worry, we’re almost home,” Cadance said, trying to be reassuring.

“I don’t- I don’t wanna go!” Twilight mumbled, putting a surprising amount of force into the barely-spoken words. Foals were good at that. It probably came with the talent at temper tantrums and pouting.

“I know you’re not feeling good, but once we get you back home and you have a nap you’ll be right as rain. That’s a pegasus saying.” Cadance gave her a smile. Twilight’s pout only got bigger in response.

“I don’t wanna go!” Twilight repeated, with the assurance of a foal that saying the same thing over and over again gave it more weight and importance. Then again, some of the politicians in court seemed to have the same idea - though they tended to be much less direct and use more words to say less.

“I know it’s been a tough day,” Cadance said softly. She could see the house now, a stately manor not far from the castle and, thankfully, able to be reached without having to use main roads. Carrying an upset filly that might go off at any time would not be very safe while pushing through a crowd, for almost exactly the same reason one wouldn't wander onto a hoofball field whilst juggling live grenades.

“I wanna stay with the nice pony!” Twilight yelled. Cadance winced as she felt a surge of magic against her own aura. A pink spark lept from the filly to Cadance's horn, nearly collapsing her spell.

Cadance really hoped she wouldn’t end up accidentally being set on fire. Sunset had done that enough on purpose with her own pranks.

“Those bad horses were hurting her! I want her, not you!” Twilight yelled, her voice getting shrill. Cadance looked around to make sure ponies weren’t staring. They were. Cadance had a sudden vision of pictures showing up in the morning paper accusing the Crown of foalnapping.

“Twilight, calm down. We’re going to see your parents. Once you settle down and feel better, we can talk about you seeing Sunset again.” Not that it was a great idea. Sunset had never been good with ponies who knew less than she did, like foals, or other ponies her age, or Cadance, or ponies older than she was… really, Sunset wasn’t very good with anypony at all. She usually got annoyed and yelled at them until they went away. Except for Celestia, of course.

Cadance pushed open the main gate and dragged Twilight inside. It was becoming increasingly difficult to keep a grip on her. She was wiggly and strong, if not very well coordinated.

“Almost there…” Cadance grunted, dragging Twilight towards the doors and grabbing the bell pull with her teeth. The chime sounded and it was thankfully only a few moments before the door opened.

“Princess Cadance?” Twilight Velvet asked, tilting her head. “I wasn’t expecting you today- is that Twilight?”

“Yes… it’s a funny story, actually,” Cadance said.

“Where’s Shining Armor?” Velvet frowned.

“I’m not sure?” Cadance matched the older mare's puzzled expression.

“It’s just that he was with Twilight at the library,” Velvet explained. “I expected them to get home together.”

“He’s probably worried, then,” Cadance sighed. “She actually appeared in the palace. Some sort of magical… accident... thing.”

“An accident?” Velvet gasped, grabbing the floating filly with her hooves and lifting her up. “Is she okay? What’s this big bruise on her head?”

“Who are you?!” Twilight demanded. “I wanna go back to the nice pony!”

“What’s going on out here?” Twilight’s father pushed past Velvet.

“There was a little accident with Twilight, Mister Night Light,” Cadance said. “She’s just a little scared and confused-”

“I wanna go back to the castle with the sun pony!”

“Princess Celestia?” Night Light asked.

“I think she means Sunset Shimmer, actually,” Cadance corrected.

“I’ve heard awful stories about her,” Velvet gasped. “What did she do to my poor little Twilight?”

“I’m not really sure. Princess Celestia is looking into it, but I’m sure she’ll be fine once she gets some rest!” She smiled forcefully.

“I don’t wanna go with the strange ponies!” Twilight shouted, finally breaking free of Cadance and backing away from all three of them.

“She doesn’t recognize us!” Velvet whispered, afraid.

“It looks like a concussion with, um, some… minor amnesia,” Cadance said. “The doctors said it’ll probably go away if she gets some sleep. She still knows things, like how to speak…” though looking at her walking, she was strangely clumsy, like she wasn’t used to coordinating on four legs.

“When I get my hooves on the pony who did this-” Velvet snorted, stomping. “Was it that Sunset Shimmer?!”

“We don’t know,” Cadance said. “At this point, it’s just as likely that Twilight miscast a spell, or flared- you know how foals are at her age. With the amount of talent she has, she could have accidentally teleported herself to the castle where we found her.”

“Accidentally teleported herself that whole distance?” Night Light looked skeptical.

“With a flare? It’s possible,” Cadance shrugged. “And magical exhaustion after a flare might be why she’s having problems remembering things.”

“Who’s having problems?” The gate pushed open, Shining Armor looking inside.

“Twilight is-” Cadance started, before she saw the inquisitive purple filly standing next to him. “....Twilight is over there?”

She looked back at the filly she’d brought to the house.

“And right… there.” Cadance blinked. “Huh.”

“Why is there another me?” Twilight asked. More specifically, the Twilight next to Shining asked. Cadance felt her grasp of the situation rapidly slipping away.

“Did Twilight surge, or have any accidents, or read any strange books?” Cadance asked, quickly. “Like, maybe, forbidden tomes of ancient evil?”

“Uh… no?” Shining Armor blinked, looking up from his sister, or at least one of them, to stare at the Princess. “I mean, I was with her the whole time. I was reading her the new Daring Do book.”

“What’s going on?” the Twilight at his hooves asked, stepping closer to her double.

“Well, um, at least this means Twilight is okay?” Cadance said, trying to put a good spin on things. “Or one of them is.”

“Then who is this?” Velvet asked, pointing at the copy.

“That is… a really good question!” Cadance said. “But she really does look like Twilight, doesn’t she? I hope we didn’t just steal a filly that was visiting the palace…”

“She doesn’t just look like Twilight, they’re exactly the same,” Shining Armor said, kneeling down. “Except for that bruise. Where did you find her?”

“Well… the guards found her with Sunset Shimmer, and might have knocked Sunset out before she could tell them anything. I’m starting to think it might have been better to get the whole story before assaulting her.”

“She’s not me,” Twilight said, firmly. “I’m me.”

“We know, Twilight,” Velvet said, stepping over to the filly to nuzzle her. “But this is still a scared, confused filly. If you were scared like her, you’d want help.”

“But I’m not scared,” Twilight said. “She’s just a stranger. Send her away.”

“I don’t like her!” The copy yelled. “I wanna go back to the sun pony!”

Shining Armor looked at Cadance.

“She means Sunset Shimmer,” Cadance said.

“Why would she want to go with that mule?” Shining Armor asked. “There are monsters in Tartarus that are probably more pleasant to be around.”

“Don't use that kind of language around fillies,” Velvet chastised.

“Make her go away!” Twilight yelled. “I’m me and she isn’t!”

“We know-” Velvet started.

“You thought she was me!” Twilight yelled, louder. “But she isn’t! I was with Shining Armor! Why would you think she was me?!”

“Twilight, calm down,” Night Light said. “She’s scared.”

The mysterious filly had backed off, shivering with terror. She was looking at Twilight and the others with open terror.
“I just wanna go home,” she whispered.

“Where is home?” Cadance asked. “Do you remember?” Maybe she was just some other filly, who looked a lot like Twilight. It was distantly possible. Another filly who looked like Twilight and had that same amount of magical power.

Maybe not entirely likely, but a one in a million chance still came up once in a while.

“T-the sun pony! Sunset!” The copy looked around. “I wanna go back to her!”

“That can’t be her real home,” Velvet whispered.

“No,” Cadance agreed. “I think this is more complicated than just a lost foal.”

“Maybe you should take her back to the palace,” Velvet suggested. “Just to help her calm down. I know when Twilight gets into a mood, it’s sometimes better to just go along with what she wants.”

“Make her go away!” Twilight huffed, stomping up to her mother and pressing her head against her mother’s leg.

“Twilight, be polite,” Velvet hissed.

“She wants to go,” Twilight said. “I want her to go. You want her to go, right?”

Velvet knelt down. “Twilight, what I see is a scared little filly who needs help, no matter who she is, or what she looks like.”

“I just…” Twilight looked at the copy. “I don’t like her,” she whispered. “She’s strange. Ponies shouldn’t look like other ponies. And she feels strange!”

“Feels strange?” Velvet asked.

“I can feel it in my horn,” Twilight said, firmly. “She’s strange.”

“I wanna go back to Sunset!” the copy yelled, starting to hyperventilate.

“I’m starting to think that would be best,” Cadance sighed. “I’m very sorry for troubling you, Miss Velvet.” She started towards the scared filly. “We’ll go find Sunset, okay?”

“You promise you won’t take me to any strange places?” the copy asked, shivering where she stood.

“We’re going to go find her together,” Cadance promised. “If you stay close to me, I won’t drag you around with magic like I was before.”

“O-okay,” the copy said. She took a hesitant step, stumbling over herself. “Stupid legs…” she muttered, trying to walk and obviously having trouble with it.

“Don’t come back,” Twilight muttered. The copy froze and huffed, wiping at her eyes before stumbling up to Cadance.

“I’ll… I’ll let you know what happens,” Cadance said, looking back at the family. “I’m really sorry about this.”

“You don’t have anything to be sorry about,” Velvet said, standing up and walking over to the copy. “Dear, I don’t know who you are, but I know there are ponies who are worried about you.” She lifted the copy’s chin with her hoof and smiled. “I know you’ll find where you belong.”

“T-thank you,” the copy said, blushing, finally starting to calm down.

“Cadance, could you let us know what happens?” Velvet looked up at the Princess. “I know it’s not exactly our business, but…”

“I understand,” Cadance smiled. “Don’t worry. I’ll keep her safe.”

“Keep her safe,” Cadance mumbled, as she walked with the filly back towards the castle. She was starting to worry about her. If she wasn’t walking correctly, didn’t that mean that more could have been wrong with her than just a bump on the head? The doctor had said it looked like it was just exhaustion and maybe a mild concussion, but maybe a second opinion and some detailed scanning spells were in order.

“Where is Sunset?” the filly asked.

“Well, she had a worse bump on the head than you,” Cadance said. “So they took her to the castle hospital.” Hopefully they hadn’t already relocated her to the dungeon. “I know Princess Celestia wanted to talk to her to find out what happened.”

“I-is Sunset a bad pony?” the filly asked. “The others were… they seemed scared of her.”

“She’s not a bad pony,” Cadance said (even if she didn't entirely believe it). “She’s just, um, she’s very lonely.”

“She was nice to me,” the filly mumbled. “And she got hurt because of me.”

“Nopony is going to blame you,” Cadance smiled. “If anything, she’s the one who put you in danger. Once she’s feeling better we’re going to find out what happened and get you home. With any luck you'll feel better and be able to tell us yourself after you get a good night's rest.”

“Okay,” the filly whispered. “But if we don’t find out, can I stay with her?”

“I don’t know if she’d-” Cadance stopped. She couldn’t just tell a scared foal that she wouldn’t be wanted, because the pony she wanted to comfort her was about two shades from being a monster. “I don’t know if she can. She’s not really old enough to take care of a filly by herself. Why do you like her so much?”

“She was there when I woke up,” the filly said. “The first thing I remember is seeing her, and she looked…” the filly swallowed. “She looked like she needed a hug.”

Cadance smiled. “You have very good instincts. She does need a hug. Maybe more than one. She doesn’t like to admit it to anypony, though.”

“M-maybe she’ll let me hug her?” the filly asked. “Then we’d both feel better…”

Cadance hesitated. The last time she'd tried to hug Sunset it had ended badly. “She’s got a lot of pride. She doesn’t like having to ask other ponies for help.”

“Oh.” The filly looked down, stopping. “Does she… will she even want to see me? She got hurt because of me.”

“Honestly?” Cadance sighed. “I don’t know. But we should still see her. Maybe she has some answers for us.”

“Okay,” the filly whispered.

They walked in silence into the hospital, a small facility located on the castle grounds, usually servicing foreign dignitaries, politicians, and other ponies that wanted privacy as well as medical care. It was modern, with the best facilities available.

Cadance led the filly up towards Sunset’s room. Thankfully, the nurses weren’t keeping that secret from her. Celestia probably hadn't gotten around to telling them to conceal everything important from the younger princess yet.

“You should know better than to experiment with strange magic,” Celestia said, Cadance recognizing her voice from outside of the room. “Hopefully that filly won’t have to pay for your mistake. Injuring another pony is a burden you carry in your heart for as long as you live.”

“I know,” Sunset said, sounding appropriately apologetic.

Cadance knocked on the doorframe, looking in the open room. “Um, I hope I’m not disturbing anything.

“Not at all, Cadance,” Celestia said. “Were you able to bring Twilight Sparkle back home?”

“Well, about that,” Cadance smiled nervously. “Funny story! They, um. They already had one!”

“Sunset!” the filly yelled, running into the room, stumbling over her own hooves and falling on the tile floor. Celestia’s golden aura caught her before she could bang her head again.

“They already had one?” Celestia asked, raising an eyebrow.

“I’d better explain everything that happened…”

An hour later, the filly was curled up next to Sunset and sleeping soundly, the older pony looking uncomfortable with the arrangement.

“So there are… two of them?” Sunset muttered.

“It seems so,” Cadance sighed. “They’re exactly identical! Well, not exactly. This one doesn't seem to remember anything, and she keeps tripping over her own hooves. That might be the concussion, though.”

“The spell I cast was supposed to activate whatever the mirror was supposed to do, I think. Like a backdoor to test the enchantment.” Sunset looked at the filly. "I don't know how this happened, unless you'd like to finally tell me what the mirror actually does?"

“I’ve seen something like this before,” Celestia said, ignoring the question. “During the reign of Discord, before I came to rule Equestria, he created magical pools. Some of them would make imperfect copies of ponies.”

“Well, I did cast the spell on a magical mirror…” Sunset muttered.

“This doesn’t seem exactly the same,” Celestia admitted, her magic gently smoothing the filly’s mane, which had become ragged and tangled by the stress of the day. “This filly certainly isn’t the type of copy Discord would create. He wouldn’t have made a single foal who needed help. He would have created a multitude of bad jokes instead.”

“She seems real,” Cadance said. “She’s not a monster.”

“Which was my other concern,” Celestia said, sounding like she was admitting something she was trying to hide. “I once did battle with a number of monsters that could assume the shape of a pony’s loved ones to steal their affection.”

“How awful!” Cadance gasped.

“They’ve been safely imprisoned for, well, probably forever,” Celestia said. She hesitated and looked to the side. “Maybe I should check some of the binding spells on my ancient foes one of these days. I keep letting it slip…”

“I think we should maybe focus on the filly,” Sunset said. “So she’s… what? A magical copy? A clone created by a miscast spell?”

“That’s going to be part of your responsibility to determine,” Celestia said. “I don’t think she’s dangerous. At least no more dangerous than you were at her age, Sunset.”

“That’s pretty dangerous." Sunset gave the filly the look an experienced animal handler gives an unfamiliar and potentially dangerous predator.

“Indeed. Taking care of her will be a very serious responsibility.”

The filly stirred at the soft speech, looking up. “A-are you gonna take me away from her?” she asked, quietly. “I promise I won’t be dangerous…”

“She’s so cute!” Cadance said. “Maybe I should-”

“I wanna stay with Sunset!” The filly was very firm on this, pounding the bed with a tiny hoof.

“That’s really Sunset’s decision,” Celestia said. “Raising a filly is a lot of work, even for ponies who have spent time planning and arranging things to take that big step in life.” She looked at Sunset, her expression unreadable. “You know better than anypony how much a growing foal needs. It's not like taking care of a pet.”

“I…” Sunset stopped what she was about to say.

Was this one of Celestia’s little tests? Taking care of the filly would mean she wouldn’t have nearly as much time for her own studies. Celestia had spent hours with her every day, and it had still felt like the mare had never been there when Sunset really needed her.

“It’s not to be taken lightly,” Celestia said, more quietly. “You should take time to think about it. Not just about what you want, or about what she wants, but about what’s best for her.” She turned to the window, looking out over Canterlot. “Sometimes that’s very difficult.”

“She can stay,” Sunset said, sharply, quickly. There was an edge to it.

“Sunset, it wasn’t a challenge.”

“No. But whatever happened, she’s my responsibility,” Sunset said. “What else would you do? Put her in an orphanage?" She spat the word with contempt. "We’d still need to find out where she came from.” She huffed and sat back, laying down in the bed. “I’m not going to wake up ten years from now wondering how that filly is doing and if I did the right thing and if she hates me the way I-” she stopped, biting her lip.

“You can’t just take care of her out of spite,” Celestia warned.

“No. I’m doing it because I can fix whatever happened!” Sunset snapped. “If she’s a filly or a mirror clone or a shapeshifter or whatever, it doesn’t matter!”

“Don’t be mad, Miss Sunset…” the filly sniffled. “I’m sorry…”

“I’m not mad,” Sunset said, trying not to growl. “I’m just sore and a little upset that the Royal Guard almost beat me to death today.”

“I see,” Celestia sighed. She stood up. “I’ll make some arrangements. I’m sure another cot can be brought out for our little guest as well. I know the doctors would like to keep Sunset overnight.”

“Can I sleep here?” the filly whispered.

“We can get you your own-” Celestia started.

“It’s fine,” Sunset said, more sharply.

“It’s fine then,” Celestia sighed. “Let the nurses know if you need anything.”

She walked out, shaking her head, Cadance following at her heels. She just hoped this wouldn’t all end in disaster.

Chapter 2

The purple filly glared at Sunset, a sour expression plastered across her face as she was slowly rotated in the grip of the older mare’s magic.

“Diagnostic spells aren’t showing anything too unusual with her biology,” Sunset muttered, a glowing quill twitching and writing on a scroll next to her, transcribing her words. “There’s some sort of faint aura, but it’s less like an active spell effect and more of a lingering trace of something already done.”

“I’m right here,” the filly said. “You don’t have to talk like I’m in the other room.” The quill added her comments, scratching across the page.

Sunset glared at the quill as if about to yell at it, for all the good it would do.

“She’s fairly normal for a filly her age,” Sunset continued, circling the floating filly. “Or at least her apparent age, since she’s only a week old at this point. Average height and weight. Magical talent seems exceptional, maybe an order of magnitude or so more than most foals.”

“Mom, put me down. I’m getting dizzy,” the filly complained, trying to free herself. Unlike Cadance’s grasp, Sunset’s was unbreakable.

“I’m not your mom,” Sunset said, almost automatically. She’d been saying it a lot. It wasn’t the type of phrase most ponies got practice with.

“Please put me down?” the filly said, more quietly.

“I just want to run a few more diagnostic rituals,” Sunset said. “I think a reversed version of one of the normal healing spells will let me draw out some of your life energy. Then I'll know if you're a construct, a changeling, or a clone. In theory.”

“I don’t like this plan,” the filly said, struggling harder. “I don’t wanna!”

“Just stop moving,” Sunset snapped, getting annoyed. “This won’t hurt. Probably. It’s an improvised spell. Actually, tell me what it feels like, for the record.”

“We’ve been here all day! I wanna get breakfast!” The filly groaned as she flipped over again. “I’m gonna be sick if you keep doing that!”

“It’s a good thing you haven’t eaten, then,” Sunset said, getting more annoyed. None of her other test subjects had complained this much. Except maybe that one study partner a teacher had assigned her, Fancy Slacks or whatever his name had been. He’d complained a lot when he was on fire. Sunset really hadn’t been assigned a partner since then, which was probably best for the other students, who generally learned better when not studying the finer points of stop, drop, and roll.

“You’re supposed to take care of me,” the filly grumped. “Not make me starve to death.”

“And you’re not going to starve to death in a few hours! I sometimes don’t eat for days at a time when I’m busy!” Sunset snapped. “It’s part of being a scholar! If you hate it so much, maybe I should tell the Princess you’d rather go to the orphanage!”

The little filly froze up.

“Or maybe go and live with that pony that you’re a copy of. Her mother must know how to keep a foal from complaining so much.” Sunset huffed. “What was I thinking? This is even worse than the goldfish…”

She dropped the filly. She hadn’t lost her concentration, Sunset was just too annoyed to keep scanning her. A solid week of getting nearly nowhere with her research was fraying every nerve she had left.

“I bet Celestia already knows what’s going on, and just refuses to tell me or point me in the right direction!” Sunset snapped. “I should go and make her tell me just what she knows…” she kept grumbling, sitting on the floor looking away from the fallen foal and grinding her teeth with frustration.

The room was quiet for a few minutes. Slowly, Sunset became aware of a sound from the other side of the room. She turned to look at the soft noise.

The little purple filly was crying in a heap on the floor.

“Please don’t send me away,” she whispered. “I-I didn’t mean to be bad…”

Sunset wasn’t a heartless pony. She yelled a lot, she got annoyed easily, and she was better than the common pony and wasn’t afraid to show it - but she wasn’t a monster. Making a filly weep like that definitely fell more on the monstrous side of things than she was comfortable with.

“No, look, I didn’t mean…” Sunset sighed. “Just stop crying. I didn’t mean to make you upset.” She stood up and walked over to the filly, looking at her. “I have a lot of really important things I need to do. Celestia wants me to study you and…” She stopped, groaning and collapsing to the floor, hooves over her face. “And to take care of you, which I’m screwing up.”

“I’m sor-” the filly started, looking up with tears in her eyes, until a hoof covered her mouth.

“No. I’m sorry,” Sunset sighed. “And don’t tell anypony I said that, because they won’t believe you. Sunset Shimmer doesn’t apologize to anypony, not even the Princess.” She uncovered her face and smiled sadly at the filly.

“Then why are you apologizing to me?” The filly sniffled.

“Because I should be taking care of you, Twilight. I’m not so stupid I don’t know that the Princess is testing me. She wants to see how I manage trying to take care of you, and I couldn't even go a week without messing it up.”

“Y-you’re not messing up. I know your studies are important, and I’m just an accident…”

“Don’t ever let anyone tell you that,” Sunset said, sharply.

“But I’m literally an accident,” the filly said.

“No,” Sunset stood up. “There was an accident, but you aren’t an accident. You’re a pony, and if anyone thinks you aren’t, you should punch them in the snout and ask them if your hoof feels real.”

The filly snorted, halfway between a laugh and a sob, and rubbed her eyes. “But I’m not real. I’m just a copy of Twilight Sparkle. I don’t even have a name.”

“Well, we can fix that,” Sunset smirked. “I’m great at naming things.”

“You can’t call me Stormageddon,” the filly huffed, glaring at Sunset.

“Why not?” Sunset demanded, annoyed. She threw the doors ahead of them open with just a little too much force, knocking over an unfortunate guard recruit who wasn’t able to get out of the way in time. She trotted past the fallen mare, not even looking at her. The filly glanced at the recruit and paused for a moment before trotting quickly to catch up with Sunset.

“Because it’s a dumb name!” The filly was struggling to keep up with Sunset - the older pony’s longer stride aside, the foal was just incredibly awkward on four hooves.

“It’s a great name!” Sunset countered. “There was a pegasus general named Stormageddon during the Rebellion era.”

“I’m not a pegasus. And that sounds like a boy’s name.”

“Fine,” Sunset sighed. “You don’t like Stormageddon, you don’t like Mega Twilight, you don’t like Lavender Unicorn. What do you want me to call you?”

“Well, um, maybe I can have a name like yours?” the filly ventured, sounding hopeful.

“Twilight Sparkle is already a lot like Sunset Shimmer,” Sunset said. She stopped in her tracks, thinking. “Actually, they mean basically the same thing. That’s kind of a strange coincidence…”

“You’re going off on a tangent again,” the filly said, headbutting Sunset’s front leg. “I don’t want her name. I want my own name, but still something like your name, because you’re…” she trailed off, blushing.

“Okay, okay, I get it, I am pretty awesome,” Sunset said, smiling a little. “How about… Midnight Twinkle?”

“Yes! That’s way better!” The filly started bouncing on her hooves, hopping around in a circle until her clumsiness caught up with her and she tripped, falling on her face. “Ow…”

“Careful. These floors are slippery.” Sunset picked her up, setting her back down on her hooves. A thin trickle of blood trailed from her snout. “Looks like you hit your nose pretty hard…”

“I-it’s nothing,” the filly said. “But I really like Midnight. Can you- can you call me that?”

“Yeah. I think I can remember that.” Sunset poked Midnight’s nose, the filly wincing in pain. “Hold on. I think I can take care of that. Healing spells aren’t exactly my specialty, but…”

Midnight flinched as Sunset’s horn started to glow, the soft light hardening to a point at the very tip before she brought it down to Midnight’s face. There was a wash of tingling cold, and the pain faded.

“There. Not bad. I think it’s a little crooked now, though.”

Midnight gasped and ran over to a window, trying to see herself in the reflection on the glass. “How bad is it?! I can’t see!”

“I’m only teasing you, squirt,” Sunset snorted, roughing up her mane with a hoof. “You’re fine. I wouldn’t cast a healing spell on you if I didn’t know what I was doing.”

“But you don’t even know what I am!” Midnight said, spinning to face her. “What if it made me explode, or, or turned me into a monster?”

“What do you think I was running all those spells before?” Sunset motioned for the filly to keep following her. “I was making sure you’re not going to fall apart or catch on fire or turn into a demon. As far as I can tell, you’re a normal filly.”

“Just normal?” Midnight sounded almost disappointed.

“Well, stronger than average,” Sunset corrected. “And reasonably intelligent. I have very high standards on that, so you should be flattered.”

“I don’t think anyone would be flattered about being ‘reasonably’ intelligent,” Midnight mumbled.

“Then you’d better get some factual evidence to back up more praise,” Sunset said. “People will always look for ways to put you down. You have to be the one to show them how great you can be.”

“So you’re never going to praise me?” Midnight’s ears folded back.

“I’ll praise you when it’s honest praise and not just making you feel better,” Sunset said. “If I always tell you you’re great, you’ll never know when you’re really improving.”

“I guess…” Midnight sighed.

“Come on. We still need to get you some food.” Sunset walked into the kitchen, the door swinging shut behind her.

Midnight ran after her, just stopping short of the door and avoiding a painful collision. She pushed at the door with her head, struggling to try and get it open.

“Come on, you stupid thing…” she huffed, trying to get traction on the marble floor. The kitchen door swung open suddenly, and she stumbled with the motion, going right into Sunset Shimmer.

“Kinda forgot you’d need help,” Sunset said, nodding to the heavy door. She ushered the filly in. “Now the good thing is, with this palace, we can get you just about anything you want to eat. Celestia’s always in meetings at odd times, so they kind of adapt to her schedule. We can get you breakfast, lunch, a five-course dinner, whatever.”

“I hope you aren’t planning on ordering my staff around,” growled a voice from within the depths of the well-stocked kitchen.

“Midnight, meet Black Kettle,” Sunset said, as an earth pony stepped into view, the sheer coal black of his coat contrasting the white hat and uniform he was wearing. “He’s the head chef here, and the only pony in the world that can give Celestia orders.”

“And don’t you forget it,” the pony snorted. “Miss Shimmer here likes to come down and yell at them until they get her absurd dinner requests absolutely right, and as such she’s banned from the kitchen, which begs the question of why you’re here and why you’ve dragged a filly along with you.”

“She’s hungry,” Sunset said. “Don’t tell me you’re going to deny a foal a meal just because you don’t like me.”

“Seems to me more like she’s suffering from your bad habits,” Black Kettle countered.

“E-excuse me,” Midnight interrupted. “What’s that smell? It smells really…” she sniffed at the air. “Really, really good!”

Sunset paused and sniffed. She wasn’t sure if she’d categorize it as good, exactly. It was savory and peppery with some kind of undertone that she couldn’t quite place. Maybe a mushroom?

“You don’t want that,” Black Kettle said, trying to get in front of the filly as she trotted over towards the source of the smell. “We’ve got a griffon ambassador, and he’s got sort of unique tastes-”

Sunset realized what it was. Meat. No wonder she hadn’t been able to place it.

“Can I try some of it?” Midnight asked, looking at Black Kettle.

“You won’t like it. It’s meat.”

“Yeah, but… can I try it?” She pressed, trying to rear up a little to look at what was cooking on the stovetop behind him.

“It’s not good for fillies,” he said.

“Is it poison?” Midnight asked. “Will it make me sick?”

“No, it’s just… not a normal thing to eat.”

“But it smells really good! Please?” She looked up at Black Kettle with the kind of tearful expression that every foal instinctively knew would get them what they wanted.

“Fine. A little. But don’t blame me when y’ hate it.” Black Kettle sighed. “Go sit over at the staff table. I’m not gonna have you sick up in one of the dining rooms and walk all the way back begging me for oats and fruit.”

“I won’t,” Midnight said.

“Bring some oats and fruit anyway,” Sunset said. “I could use something simple like oatmeal.” And, though she didn’t say it, it would save him a trip later and let the filly save some face.

“Just this once, and I expect a please and thank you next time!” Black Kettle said.

Sunset rolled her eyes and sat down with Midnight at the wooden table tucked off to the side of the kitchen, close enough that people sitting at it could keep an eye on what was cooking, but far away enough from the action that they wouldn’t be in the way. It looked like a simple table, yet a discerning eye could tell it had been there for centuries. There were stains older than some countries.

“I usually eat with Celestia,” Sunset said. “Or at least she usually reminds me to eat when we’re having lessons. I forget and skip meals if ponies aren’t there to get me away from my studies.”

“And she’s a Princess, so she’s really important?” Midnight asked. “And so you must be really important too. Are you her daughter?”

“No,” Sunset said, her expression falling. “I’m just… a student.”

The orphanage was cold. It was always cold. Canterlot was high up on a mountain and the building was old. Sunset didn’t know much about the ancient heating system except that it was rarely working and even more rarely turned on.

The other foals sat by the fire. On the worst winter nights they’d gather everypony up into one of the main rooms and have them sleep in front of the fireplace. Whenever Sunset tried to join them, the older foals forced her to the back, so far from the flames that she was still left shivering.

She couldn’t even remember her parents. She’d been brought here as a newborn, and had to endure year after year of watching all the other foals get picked first. She was unwanted from the moment she came into the world.

Sunset tried getting along with the foals. She tried making friends. The few successes she had vanished from her life as quickly as they came, the colts and fillies being adopted and leaving her behind. The rest bullied her, just a blank flank with no special talent.

When she learned how to make her own fire with her magic, she stopped fighting for a spot in front of the fireplace. She didn’t offer to share, or to help others. They’d never helped her, and the only pony she needed was herself. The other foals could do whatever they wanted, and if they decided to bother her, they’d be reminded that fire didn’t just keep you warm, it could burn.

“Just a student,” Sunset repeated, looking down at the table. She coughed, regaining her composure. “Well, that’s sort of understating it. I’m Princess Celestia’s personal student, so you could say I was selected as the only pony in the world worthy of being trained personally by a Goddess.”

“Oh wow…” Midnight gasped.

“And since you’re my….” She had no idea what the right word was. Germane had an unwieldy compound word that described her situation perfectly, but Sunset didn't know it. “My responsibility, I’m going to make sure you don’t make the same mistakes I did at your age.”

“But you’re really important, so you must have done a lot of stuff right, too!” Midnight smiled up at the older pony. Sunset felt her face grow hot. She liked praise. She was used to praise from professors that were just doing their job, from other students at the School for Gifted Unicorns who wanted to ride on her coattails.

This felt more like the very rare times Celestia praised her. Not just for getting a question right or performing some new spell, but the warm, quiet praise she gave Sunset when she was genuinely proud of her student. It felt like basking in the sun on a warm day.

Midnight’s praise was that same kind of… Sunset wasn’t sure what to call it. A genuine quality, maybe.

“I’ll make sure you get that stuff right too,” Sunset said. “I want you to remember this as the best time of your life. You shouldn’t have to deal with the same horseapples I did.”

Midnight tilted her head and was clearly about to ask for specifics on that when a plate was put down in front of her.

“For the filly, one small portion of steak.” It was just three bites, each no larger than a bit. Sunset was surprised that he’d given the filly even that much. Steak was prohibitively expensive, not just because the Equestrian market for it was so small but because only a small number of cows donated their bodies after their deaths. In some other nations it was much easier to get as long as you didn't ask where it came from.

“And for the lady, a pot of oatmeal and some fruit salad. With an extra bowl in case your ward here wants some.” Black Kettle put the pot down on the table. He’d easily made enough for both of them. Before she could even ask, a bowl of sugar and cinnamon joined it.

“Thanks,” Sunset said. She spooned out some oatmeal for herself and watched Midnight as the filly stared intently at the steak, sniffing it. Midnight grabbed a fork with her hoof and awkwardly speared one of the beef tips, juices trickling out onto the plate.

“This would be a lot easier if I could use magic…” Midnight mumbled. She raised the fork to her lips and bit into the steak.

“Now if you don’t want to eat that, you can have some of my…” Sunset trailed off, blinking. She’d expected the filly to make a face and spit the beef out. Instead, she was going back for a second, larger bite. The second piece of meat disappeared after the first. A few moments later, the plate was empty, and Midnight was licking her lips.

“That was so good!” Midnight said, happily. “Can I have more?”

Author's Note

I discovered very early on that I couldn't just leave her name as Twilight, because it would make the prose in later chapters awkward and potentially confusing. Some of the other names I considered were Sunrise, Eventide, and That Dang Horse. In the end I settled on Midnight for one simple reason - we already know it's exactly the kind of name she'd give herself, in other circumstances.

And yes, her using anyone/someone instead of anypony/somepony is deliberate. It's a hard habit to break!

Chapter 3

“Hmph. A full hoof taller than when you showed up last year.” Sunset smiled. “At this rate you’ll be as tall as Princess Celestia by the time you're my age.”

Midnight snorted with laughter as Sunset finished her weekly diagnostic spell. “No I won’t! No one, or um, nopony is that tall. That's an incorrect use of linear extrapolation.” Midnight still hadn’t quite broken her habit of saying ‘someone’ or ‘anyone’ or ‘no one’ instead of the more common ‘somepony’ and so on.

It was an odd quirk since her vocabulary was otherwise extremely strong for a foal of her apparent age. It had put Sunset on a path of trying to prove she was a shapeshifter or had gotten herself on the wrong end of a polymorph spells. The only thing Sunset had learned from it all was that there were more monsters that'd impersonate a foal than she'd known about off-hoof, and Midnight wasn't any of them.

At least she'd be ready for it if she had to hunt down a kelpie or a black-eyed foal.

She lifted a foreleg and let Sunset scan her hooves. Having to do this every week had gotten Midnight used to the routine that Sunset used. She’d seen the spell cast so often she could almost manage it herself, or at least she thought she could, if she could just get her magic working at all.

“Nopony?” Sunset asked. “What about that model you have all those pictures of? What’s her name? Flour d’Less?”

“Fleur Dis Lee,” Midnight corrected. “And I don’t have that many pictures of her!” It wasn't even two orders of magnitude, which was pretty small potatoes as far as mathematicians were concerned.

“Sure, sure, whatever you say,” Sunset smirked. “Well, the good news is that you’re still a perfectly normal pony, as far as I can tell. Which proves that I’m the best spellcaster since Star Swirl disappeared.”

“Didn’t you say you figured out it was an accident?” Midnight frowned.

“It wasn’t an accident,” Sunset said, tilting her nose up regally. “I was trying to cast a spell to crack the protections on the enchantment's effects, but because I put way too much force into it, the effect latched onto a strong magical beacon, in this case Twilight Sparkle trying to cast spells in the Canterlot Public Library and failing, creating a large buildup of magic.” Sunset coughed and shrugged. “Then the spell fowled up, the mirror tried to shape it like it was part of whatever illusion enchantment is on it, and boom, out you come.”

“That has a lot of suppositions and assumptions and sounds a lot like an accident.”

“It fits all the data, at least what little Celestia has let me look at,” Sunset said, cutting her off. “My official analysis is that you’re the mare Twilight Sparkle wishes she was, Midnight. The mirror showed me what I wanted to be, so it has to have some kind of psychothamaphotonic effect."

"You made up that word."

“If I did it's because I invented a new branch of magical science.” Sunset strutted towards the door. “Now if I remember correctly, Celestia reserved the West Parlor for us for today.”

“I still think this is a bad idea,” Midnight said, following the older pony. “It isn’t like I was born, so celebrating a birthday seems arbitrary.”

“It would be stranger not to celebrate one,” Sunset said. “And I think you deserve something after surviving with me taking care of you for a whole year. You lasted a lot longer than the goldfish.”

“Only because I can tell you when I’m hungry. You’d let me starve otherwise.” Midnight scurried after Sunset as they trotted through the palace. Sunset would have teleported, but the holes in the wards that she’d exploited a year ago had all been patched. She’d had to do a lot of the enchantment work herself as part of her punishment for breaking a priceless magical artifact.

Sunset rolled her eyes and held the door open for Midnight. The West Parlor was a fairly small room, at least compared to some of the palace’s huge ballrooms. A need to accommodate Princess Celestia had made most of the public areas of the castle rather huge in scale.

“It’s kind of empty,” Midnight whispered. There was a table set up with punch and cake, a few streamers and balloons, and only a few ponies in the room. All of them were palace staff.

“I wasn’t really sure who to invite,” Sunset admitted. “I don’t really do much for my birthday, and you really haven’t met a lot of ponies."

"Princess Cadance was nice. Is she coming?"

"I hope not," Sunset grumbled. "With any luck she's still in Yakyakistan."

Midnight's ears folded back, and she wondered if she'd said something wrong.

“Ah, Sunset, I thought you wouldn’t be here for a few more minutes.” The room grew a few degrees warmer as Princess Celestia entered through the large double doors across the parlor. Her timing was suspiciously perfect for somepony who was implying they were caught unaware.

“Princess,” Sunset said, lowering her gaze.

“This was a wonderful idea,” Celestia said. “It got your little one out of your room and got me away from a rather dull meeting about tax evasion. I swear, the Bluebloods would do anything to shave a few bits off of their civic duties, including spending twice as much in court arguing that they aren’t committing crimes.”

“Yes, Princess,” Sunset said, still looking at her hooves.

“Sunset, please,” Celestia sighed. “I already explained that I’m not angry with you. You made a mistake, you were punished, and it’s behind you now. The important thing is to learn from it, and from what I’ve seen, you have.” She smiled down at Midnight. “And we’ve got this cute little filly to thank for some of it.”

Midnight blushed. “T-thank you, Princess.”

“And I’ve brought a few presents as well,” Celestia said. “The first of which is your birthday cake. I happen to know some of the best bakers in the world, including Mister Gustave le Grand.”

“Is it a special cake?” Midnight asked.

“Very special,” Celestia smiled. “It’s got four types of chocolate. I almost stole a slice before you got a chance to see it.”

“I wouldn’t mind, Princess,” Midnight said. “I can’t eat a lot of cake.”

“Don’t say that until you try it,” Celestia smirked. “You have my permission to eat as much as you want, and since I’m your guardian’s teacher, she can’t say no.”

Midnight giggled. “Thank you!”

“I got you a few other little things that I think you’ll like. And I’m not the only one.” She motioned to a small group of wrapped boxes. “Why don’t you go take a look?”

“Okay!” Midnight grinned and ran off to paw through them, leaving Sunset and Celestia behind.

“She’s an adorable little foal,” Celestia said, quietly, lowering her head to speak more easily to her student.. “She reminds me of you at her age.”

When Sunset didn’t answer, she looked over at her student, who was still examining her hooves intently.

“Sunset, what’s wrong?”

“It’s nothing, Princess,” Sunset said, quickly.

“It’s not nothing. I don’t like seeing you like this.” Celestia wrapped a wing around the unicorn, pulling her closer. “I know you're disappointed that you weren't able to repair the mirror, but it was made by Star Swirl, and even I am not entirely sure how the enchantment works. We agreed that it was safest to put it in storage until we could find a clue."

“I thought you were going to kick me out,” Sunset muttered. “I broke something over a dozen centuries old."

“Sunset, I wouldn’t do that to you. I care about you just as much as you care about Midnight.” Celestia smiled. “Sometimes, yes, that means I get frustrated when you aren’t living up to your potential. And sometimes it means I have to give you a little push in the right direction, even when you don’t want to go.”

“But we haven’t even had lessons since then, and-”

“And it’s about time we started getting back into the swing of things,” Celestia said, nodding. “If you’re ready to listen to what I’m teaching you, instead of just want you want to hear.”

“There are a lot of presents!” Midnight said, excited. “Can you help me open them, Mom?”

“I’m not-” Sunset swallowed the reflex, smiling nervously and pulling away from Celestia to join Midnight. It was a lot less awkward to shoot Midnight down when Celestia wasn't literally looking over her shoulder. “Sure. Where do you want to start?”

“Princess Cadance sent a card, so we should start with that,” Midnight said. “I read that it’s polite to start with the cards.”

“Such a refined lady,” Sunset snorted.

“Unlike somepony I remember who decided to open all of her birthday gifts at once to see if it was more exciting than doing it one at a time,” Celestia said. “If I recall correctly, it took hours to get all the wrapping paper cleaned up after it was shredded.”

“But the gifts were unharmed, so my calculations were correct,” Sunset said, defensively.

“Ah, yes. Of course,” Celestia said, not arguing.

“What’s it say?” Midnight asked, impatient.

Sunset opened the envelope and drew out the card. “It says ‘The greatest gift is love, but I hope this is a close second.’” Sunset revealed a ticket. “Looks like she got you some dance classes, squirt.”

“Dance classes?” Midnight tilted her head.

“It’s a good idea,” Sunset said. “You and I both know how clumsy you can be, kid. A few classroom sessions and you’ll be as light on your hooves as a pegasus.”

“That sounds fun,” Midnight smiled. “Maybe I’ll even get a cutie mark in it!”

“Maybe,” Sunset said, returning the filly’s smile. “But you’d have to practice really hard.”

“You should open the next one,” Celestia encouraged.

Sunset knelt down to whisper in Midnight’s ear. “She’s only interested in getting to the cake.” The filly giggled and picked out another present, pushing it from the pile with her nose. It was a box half the size of the foal, carefully and very precisely wrapped in purple paper.

“I’m gonna open this one next.” Midnight said. “Who’s it from?”

Sunset checked the small card on the box. “It’s from Twilight Velvet and Night Light.”

“Those are Twilight Sparkle’s parents,” Midnight said. “Why would they send me anything?”

“Because they’re very kind ponies.” Celestia said. “And you should write them a thank you card later.”

“First, you should open it,” Sunset said. Midnight nodded and carefully opened the package, using her hooves and, after a moment of frustration with the ribbon, her teeth. The box yielded to her assault, opening to reveal a stuffed toy almost as big as the filly who was picking it up.

“This is…” Midnight trailed off, looking at it. Something about it seemed so familiar. She squeezed the soft figure, the gray felt and button eyes pressing against her coat in a way that made her feel like she was on the edge of remembering something, like a dream that faded until it was just a single, wordless feeling.

“I think it’s hoofmade,” Sunset noted.

She looked up at Sunset. “I like it.”

“I had a toy like that a long time ago,” Sunset said. “I can’t remember what I named her.”

“As I recall, you named her Commander Striker and insisted that she was the only friend you needed,” Celestia said. “I also recall how many times I had to help you repair her after you tested spells on her.”

“It wasn’t that often,” Sunset mumbled, feeling an odd surge of guilt that her doll was sitting in the back of some closet gathering dust.

“Of course not,” Celestia agreed. “Now, might I make a royal request and ask that you open this one next?” Celestia smiled and pulled one of the other presents over to Midnight.

“O-of course you can, Princess,” Midnight said, putting the doll down next to her and taking the small box, only as big as her hoof. She carefully took the top off of the tiny package to reveal a golden maneclip embossed with a picture of the sun. As Midnight tilted it, the metal almost seemed to shimmer and glow from within.

“I thought about getting you a dress, but at your age, foals tend to grow out of them too quickly,” Celestia explained, lifting the hair clip up in her magic. “I decided to get you something that would be a bit longer-lasting than that. May I?”

Midnight nodded, and Celestia slipped the maneclip onto her dark mane, pinning her bangs on one side back behind her ear.

“That’s… is that orichalum?” Sunset asked. She leaned in closer to look at the metal.

“I’m a bit out of practice at forging it, but it came out well,” Celestia said. “It’s enchanted so you can always find it when you’re looking for it, and it won’t fall out unless you want it to come out.”

“Thank you, Princess,” Midnight smiled, the golden metal glimmering as if it was under the noon sun despite the dim light of the room.

“I also got you a few other things,” Celestia said. “Nothing too expensive-”

“Compared to that?” Sunset snorted. “I hope not. That could buy a house!”

Celestia laughed, leaning down to nuzzle Midnight for a moment. “Let an old mare spoil her granddaughter. It isn’t often enough that I get to celebrate a birthday for somepony who really needs to be spoiled.”

“Granddaughter?” Midnight asked, blushing.

"Everypony needs to be doted on once in a while," Celestia explained. "I haven't gotten to be somepony's grandmother in many, many years. I need to make sure I'm still in practice."

“Is that how it works?” Midnight asked, looking at Sunset for confirmation.

“W-well, I mean-” Sunset stammered, feeling rather put upon. She subconsciously looked around the room to make sure no one was around to spread rumors about how soft she was getting. “Yeah, sure ”

“Why don’t we open Sunset’s present for you next?” Celestia suggested. “I think the rest of mine can wait.”

Midnight looked up at Sunset expectantly, smiling. Sunset spotted her gift, one of the few left unwrapped, and pulled it over. Compared to Celestia’s precise wrapping, hers was clearly done via the method of using much more tape and paper than needed and just sort of balling up the wrapping paper around the gift and holding it in place.

“I’m not really good at wrapping stuff,” Sunset admitted.

“It’s okay. The fun part is unwrapping it!” Midnight grinned and took it, eager to see what treasure awaited her.

“Now this is going to take a little explanation,” Sunset said, as Midnight pulled the paper away, revealing a worn and heavily-used book. “This is the first spellbook Celestia ever gave me. Before I had it, I was…” she paused. “I was alone, and I had to figure things out without help. I read that book all the time. And more than that…” Sunset opened the book, revealing hoof-written notes in the margins. “This has everything I learned that the book didn’t cover. Better ways to cast spells, tips that Celestia gave me, that sort of thing.”

“And I can learn to do magic like you do if I read this?” Midnight asked, her eyes wide.

“No,” Sunset said. “Reading is only part of it. You also have to practice. Learning theory is nice and all but you have to be willing to actually try stuff and learn from your mistakes. I've made a lot of mistakes."

“So have I,” Celestia said. “The mark of a good teacher is a willingness to remember your own errors and help others avoid the same pitfalls. Perhaps we could invite her along to the lesson?”

“Really?” Midnight asked. “But wouldn’t I just slow you down? I mean, I’m not any good at magic.”

“Not any good at magic yet,” Sunset corrected.

“But before we go, we should make sure you have enough energy,” Celestia said. “I eat a few slices of cake every day, and I’m strong enough to raise the sun.”

“And you have to use a chair that’s reinforced enough to be considered a major structural component of the castle,” Sunset quipped.

“It’s called a throne,” Celestia said, raising her nose. She held the stuck-up pose for a few moments before losing her composure and giggling. “Now come along. The birthday filly gets the first slice.”

“That cake was amazing,” Midnight sighed, as she followed Sunset and Princess Celestia into a room that was reserved for practicing spellcasting. That largely meant making it fireproof and enchanting the windows to be unbreakable.

“You can have more after dinner,” Sunset said, patting her on the back. “If Princess Celestia doesn’t have it locked away in the Royal Cake Reserve for safekeeping.”

“It’s the most secure depository of baked goods in the world,” Celestia noted. “It was originally built to use vaults with preservation spells to hold a reserve of grain and fresh food in case of famine. Over time, when famines began to be less of a concern, I reserved a room to keep some of my favorite foods available all year. Like having a wine cellar, but for rare foods.”

“Rare foods like a thousand different cakes,” Sunset snorted. “She saves one every year.”

“It’s for a special occasion,” Celestia said, quietly. She cleared her throat and continued in a more normal tone. “Sunset, why don’t you begin with a summary of the last thing we were working on?”

"If I remember correctly,” Sunset said. "The last thing we were doing was working on creating a vector trap.”

“What’s that?” Midnight asked.

“It’s a type of magically isolated area of space. The name comes from the process used to make it - anything moving in any direction from the inside goes in a closed loop, while anything trying to get in from outside is transported in a curve around it. It’s like, um…” Sunset looked around, then grabbed a piece of paper. “Okay, so imagine the surface of this paper is the space inside the vector trap. Normally, things can go in from one side and out the other.” Her horn pulsed, and an arrow appeared on the paper, moving from one edge to the opposite and then off the page before vanishing. “But in a vector trap, all paths become closed loops.” She rolled it up so one edge touched the other. The arrow reappeared, and moved in tight circles around the paper. “It can’t leave now. That’s inside the vector trap. Outside, nothing can get in. Like on this piece of paper, there’s no edge to start on. It has to go around.”

“That sounds really complicated.” Midnight frowned.

“It’s very advanced magic,” Celestia said. “But it can be used for a lot of purposes. The principles involved form the basis of most teleportation, apparition, and banishment spells.”

Sunset looked at Midnight pensively. “Princess, maybe we should start with something easier. It has been a while, and I don’t want to scare Midnight off of magic forever.” She smiled. “I think you told me once that teaching somepony else is the best way to learn.”

“Indeed I did,” Celestia nodded. “In fact, since we have your first spellbook, why don’t we start with the basics of telekinesis?”

An hour later, Sunset and Celestia watched as the filly focused on the tea set the maids had put out on the table.

“It should take days to learn basic telekinesis,” Sunset whispered. “She shouldn’t even be able to channel magic like that yet.” She nodded towards the filly’s glowing horn.

“That would be true for a normal filly,” Celestia agreed. “But Midnight is hardly normal. Even putting her origins aside, she has nearly as much power at her disposal as you did at her age, not to mention a mother with rather extraordinary amounts of talent.”

Sunset smiled for a moment. “I remember when I first started learning magic with you. It was really…” She stopped, taking a deep breath to compose herself. “I was going to say it was nice, but that doesn’t really cover it, does it? It was the first time I ever felt like I really belonged anywhere.”

“Being different is hard for a foal,” Celestia said. “Being too talented, or not talented enough, not being of the same tribe as your friends, even just having different interests. When I took you in as my student, I told you that you were destined for greatness, and I meant it.”

“You’re still going to say that after I disobeyed you and broke an ancient, irreplaceable artifact?”

“Maybe it was for the best that it broke. You were getting obsessed with it. When I see you with Midnight, what I see is how much you’ve matured in such a short time. I’m proud of you.”

“I’m just doing the same things you did with me.” Sunset shrugged, blushing.

“Hopefully not all the same things. I introduced you to apocalypse magic a little earlier than I should have.” Celestia laughed quietly, trying not to break Midnight’s focus.

“It was fun to learn, though, because you were the one teaching me.”

"The Yaks found it significantly less 'fun' when you melted that glacier."

Midnight bit her lip as she concentrated, the ornate teacup rising into the air, surrounded by a wavering pink aura.

“Just try to keep the magic even,” Sunset said. “You’re doing great!”

“I think I’ve almost-” Midnight gasped as a sudden surge in the energy shattered the teacup. She immediately dropped it, the porcelain tinkling as it landed on the table. “Oh no! I’m so sorry! I didn’t mean to break it!”

“It’s only a teacup, Midnight,” Princess Celestia said. “Much less valuable than the lesson you learned. You’re much stronger than the average filly. One of the most important things about learning magic is learning to control it.” She picked up the pieces in her golden magic. “Using strength like yours when you haven’t been taught discipline and control will lead to breaking more than just a cup.”

“Can you fix it?” Midnight asked.

“Like this?” Celestia smiled and in a flash, the cup was restored, without even a crack to show it had been broken before. “That’s not hard.”

“What’s hard is if you… if you hurt somepony,” Sunset said. “Even if you didn’t mean to do it.”

“Did you ever hurt somepony?” Midnight asked, afraid.

“It was a long time ago,” Sunset said, trying to sound reassuring. “It was before Princess Celestia made me her student. The good thing is, you’ve got ponies around to help you. Even if I’m a little jealous about how quickly you’re picking things up.”

“But I broke the cup,” Midnight said. “I did it wrong.”

“You did it more right than wrong,” Sunset said. “And without even studying the basics first. With a little practice, you’re going to have it down like the back of your hoof.”

“I don’t really know the back of my hoof very well. I’ve only had it for a year,” Midnight said.

“Better than the back of your hoof, then,” Sunset said. “The point is that you’re good at this. Probably because you inherited a little something from me.”

“You really think so?” Midnight smiled, looking up at her.

“No doubt about it. We’ll really find out when we get to the fire spells.” She heard Celestia cough behind her. “Which we’ll learn after careful study of the dangers of hazardous magic, fire safety, and learning several extinguishing spells.”

“Better,” Celestia stage whispered, winking at Midnight. “She burned down the castle once.”

“That was your fault, not mine!” Sunset protested. “You told me, ‘Sunset, I want you to make the biggest flame you can’. And it didn’t burn down the castle. It only burned down part of the castle.”

“Of course, Sunset, as you say,” Celestia said. “Only part of the stone castle.”

“Can you tell me the story?” Midnight asked.

“Certainly, my little pony,” Celestia fluttered her wings, getting ready to tell the tale. “Once upon a time, in the land of Equestria, Sunset Shimmer was a sly, passionate filly about your age, who wanted nothing more than to impress her teacher, no matter the cost in property damage…”

Midnight sat down next to Sunset, leaning against her as Celestia told the story. Sunset sighed and settled in, smiling despite the fact that the story was about one of her few failures.

Author's Note

There's an xkcd for that.

I know what you're thinking - why hasn't Celestia actually talked to them and leveled with Sunset and Midnight about the truth?

We'll circle back around to that one before this is over. She does have a reason.

Chapter 4

Twilight walked down the street, her mother holding her hand. She looked down at her feet, staring at the patent leather shoes she had been forced to wear. They pinched her toes and the bottoms were slick, unworn leather, giving her little traction on the pavement.

“Are we there yet?” She asked. They’d had to park blocks and blocks away from where they were going, and the press of the crowd was making her anxious. It felt like they’d been walking for hours in the hot sun.

“Just one more block, Twilight,” her mother said, squeezing her hand. “It’s a very important show, you know.”

Something about the name sounded wrong, like music that was being played out of key.

“I know, Mom,” Twilight said.

“It’s one of the most important finds since the recovery of the Idol of Borealis!” Her mother seemed excited, but the whole thing made Twilight feel sick. Twilight couldn’t put her hoof- her finger on why, though.

“Are you going to write about it in your next book?” Twilight asked.

“I’ll have to see it with my own eyes first,” her mother said. “I pride myself on historical accuracy. If it looks good, I’ll talk to the museum director and see if I can’t get a few details they aren’t releasing to the public.”

Twilight tried to listen as her mother led her up the stairs, but everything just seemed to blur together. The crowd of people around her - oddly alien, bizarrely tall - scared her. She clung to her mother.

“Here we are,” her mother said, leading her to the front of the crowd, which was gathered around a glass case. “Can you believe it?”

Twilight peeked out from behind her mother. There was something in the case, looking back at her. The lights shifted, and she finally got a good look at it. A purple pony, with dark hair, looking at her like she was some kind of monster.

She raised a hand, and the pony raised its hoof, a perfect mirror image. It looked at Twilight and tried to say something, and she felt herself mouthing the words.

“You don’t belong here.”

Midnight grabbed the blanket over her, kicking and scared. She couldn’t get a grip on it. She couldn’t feel her fingers! She started crying, panic overwhelming her, until the blanket was pulled away and she felt herself drawn into a warm embrace.

“Calm down. It’s okay.”

Midnight looked around the room, still dazed. It was her room, in the palace. The hooves wrapped around her were warm and orange, holding her tight enough against Sunset’s chest that she could hear the heartbeat with her face pressed into the silky coat.

“I just-” Midnight started, trying to put her feelings into words. “I was-” Her breath caught in her throat.

“It was just a dream,” Sunset said. “You’re safe.”

“No! It was- it was…” Midnight trailed off. The dream was already fading away from her memory. All she could really remember was how it made her feel. Alone. Like she didn’t belong. The ever-present worry that maybe she wasn’t real in some vitally important, inexplicable way.

“It was a dream,” Sunset repeated. “It can’t hurt you.” She squeezed Midnight. The breathing and heartbeat and just not being alone helped wash away the last of the formless terror, leaving Midnight feeling worn out, like she’d worked herself to exhaustion instead of getting sleep.

“I hate nightmares,” Midnight muttered.

“I used to get really bad dreams,” Sunset said. “Even worse than yours. Sometimes Celestia would hear me and she’d come running to hold me just like this.”

“Only sometimes?” Midnight asked, turning her head to try and look at her mother.

“Princess Celestia is an important pony. She’d have more important things to do, or she’d have to be out of the country…” Sunset sighed. “I couldn’t always be the most important thing in her life. Her other responsibilities mattered too much."

“But you’re important too,” Midnight protested.

“I’m important to you,” Sunset said. “And you’re important to me. There’s not really much point wishing for more.” She sighed and squeezed Midnight one more time before letting go. “Now, since you’re awake, we might as well start getting you ready for your first day of school.”

Midnight groaned. This wasn’t something she was looking forwards to.

“But you and Princess Celestia can teach me instead,” Midnight protested. “Then I wouldn’t have to go, and I’d learn a whole bunch, I promise!”

“I bet you would,” Sunset smiled. “But Princess Celestia thinks you need to meet foals your own age. Besides, magic kindergarten will be a lot of fun. You’ll be mostly playing and doing… activities…” Sunset wasn’t actually sure exactly what went on at a normal school. “The point is, you have to go, and you’ll like it.”

“I don wanna,” Midnight muttered.

“Yeah, but you’re going to anyway,” Sunset said, getting out of bed and dragging Midnight with her, the filly making a grumpy face as she was levitated across the room. “Give it a week. New things are hard at first, but it gets easier.”

“But they’re prolly gonna make me do stupid stuff,” Midnight protested. “I wanna go with you and learn more apocalypse magic.”

“I really shouldn’t have let you sit in on that lesson,” Sunset muttered, putting the filly down. “If you walk to breakfast, you can have Prench Toast and extra syrup. If you make me carry you the rest of the way, you get cereal.”

“If I carry you, can I stay here instead of going to magic kindergarten?”

Sunset shook her head.

Midnight huffed. “Fine. Then I guess extra syrup will have to do.” She stomped towards the dining room with all the frustrated fury of a child, her night terror already forgotten.

Magic Kindergarten was an important part in the development of any young unicorn, like flight camp for pegasi and whatever it is that young earth ponies do when they aren’t busy with manual labor.

Twilight Sparkle was well aware of how vital this was. It would be the first line in her permanent record, the first thing the most important people in the world - teachers, principals, tutors - would see when they asked the question ‘who is Twilight Sparkle?’

Consequently, she’d arrived an hour early. None of the teachers had been there yet, but one of the janitors had let her in after seeing her waiting outside for ten minutes. That still gave her time to reread the textbook’s first few chapters and get the seat closest to the teacher’s desk. Everything was going exactly as planned.

“What are you doing here?” Asked an older voice as the door opened. Twilight looked up at the clock. Only half an hour had passed while she had been reading.

“I’m studying before class,” Twilight said. She looked at the older mare standing in the doorway. “Are you the teacher?”

The mare smiled. “I’m Ms. Wormwood. If you’re here for magic kindergarten, I’m afraid you’re a bit early. I was just going to get the classroom ready before students started arriving.”

“I wanted to make sure I was the first one here!” Twilight said, smiling. “Since I’m here early, I had a few questions! I was reading the textbook and it says that unicorn magic is called ‘true magic’, but that doesn’t seem right since magic is actually a type of energy that isn’t unique to any race or species.”

“It sounds like you’re ahead of the book,” Ms. Wormwood said. “Don’t worry too much about it. In fact, I’m going to tell you a secret that nopony else in the class is going to know.”

“Really?” Twilight’s eyes widened, sparkling in anticipation.

“Just about everything in that book is wrong, in some way. Magic can be extremely complicated, and it takes a genius to figure it all out. If you try to explain things at that level, most ponies wouldn’t even be able to start learning.” She picked up her copy of the book from her desk. “For example, the book says that magic flows through your body to your horn, and briefly mentions leylines, but it doesn’t go into detail on how or why, because that requires explaining thaumatic pressure, which requires math you won’t learn until you’re in college.”

“I saw some stuff about thaumatic pressure,” Twilight said. “There was…” She scrunched her face up. “A lot of symbols. There were numbers like regular math, but there was a triangle and a weird-looking letter E, and my big brother couldn’t explain it and told me to pick out a different book.”

“That’s exactly what I mean,” Ms. Wormwood agreed. “But you can understand the basics without having to know all of those details. Like you can learn how to write without knowing how ink is made, or how a quill functions.”

“But doesn’t that mean we’ll be learning it wrong?” Twilight asked. This seemed offensive on a basal level.

“Some of it is simplified,” Ms. Wormwood said. “Like when you were learning to read, you started by learning the alphabet. You had to learn the sounds each letter made, then put them together to make words. There are words that don’t follow the rules, like how the ‘k’ in knight is silent, but you have to learn the basics before you start learning the exceptions.”

“I see…” Twilight frowned.

“Don’t worry. What you’re going to learn are the basic ideas and concepts of magic. You’ll build on them later. In fact, here’s an idea - why don’t you write down any questions you have during the lessons, and I’ll answer them for you after class?”

“Why can’t you answer them during the lesson?”

“I have a feeling you’re going to want more detailed answers than the others are ready for. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m just going to get a few things from the storeroom.”

Twilight nodded and rummaged around in her saddlebags when the teacher had left, pulling out a scrap of paper with a list written on it in crayon. She checked off an item near the top of the long list.

"Meet the teacher," she read. "One down, ninety-eight to go."

Midnight Twinkle was also aware of just how important Magic Kindergarten was. If she didn’t go, she’d get yelled at a lot, and she’d never get any dessert. She heard a bell ring as she walked into the school. That second serving of Prench toast had made her late for class! She was going to have to hope Sunset didn’t find out about this. Not that she ever didn’t find out.

“Maybe she’s watching me with scrying spells…” She looked around, as if she’d see the spell hanging over her.

“Well look at what we have here,” a pony snorted, his voice high and nasally, forcing the accent that the most entrenched of the nobility used.

Midnight spotted the colt just before he pushed her. With her natural dexterity (or lack thereof), there was no chance she’d be able to save herself. She fell on her flank, saddlebags spilling everywhere.

“Hmph. You must be one of the peasant fillies.” The colt looked down his nose at her. “Making me late for class, too. You should apologize to me.”

Midnight stood up, looking at her spilled papers. She turned to the colt, horn blazing with energy.

Ms. Wormwood was walking back to class when she heard a pony sniffling and papers shuffling. She put the box of crayons and paper down and trotted down the hallway towards the doors.

“What are you doing here?” She asked, surprised to see the lavender filly she’d left in her classroom.

“I was walking and this pony knocked me over and-” She sniffled, picking up scattered papers around her.

“Don’t worry about that. Let me help you.” Ms. Wormwood picked the sheets up, stacking them and putting them into the filly’s saddlebag. “Not quite in order, but it’ll be easy to fix that later.” She led the filly back to the classroom. “I was just getting some supplies so we could start out with some nice pictures to practice telekinesis and-”

She blinked, and looked at the seat closest to her desk. There was a lavender filly there reading a book. Wormwood looked down at the filly she was leading. Then back up at the one in the classroom.

“Oh. Her.” The one at her hooves sounded annoyed and walked in.

“Two of them?” Ms. Wormwood asked. She'd never learned any precognitive spells but some basal part of her awareness, the part that before civilizations had led to unicorns organizing their herds entirely on the basis of magical power, was extremely worried.

Twilight Sparkle looked up and saw Midnight, her expression changing. Midnight looked over the room and after a moment, sat in the sole available seat, right next to Twilight.

“Are you going to copy my answers?” Twilight asked.

“Why would I bother? I have the best teachers in the world already!” Midnight huffed. “I’m just here because my mom says I need to meet ponies my own age.”

"Are you going to try stealing their faces too?"

“Girls, no fighting,” Ms. Wormwood said. She could at least deal with children being snippy at each other. That was normal. They just usually weren't identical.

“Yes, Ma’am,” Twilight said.

“Now, I have some worksheets and crayons for all of you,” Ms. Wormwood said, clearing her throat and addressing the classroom. “Today is your first day, so I thought the best way to start would be drawing a picture of your family. I want all of you to practice using your telekinesis to do it. Anypony having problems, don’t be embarrassed. We’re all here to learn.”

She put a sheet on every seat until she came to one that had saddlebags at it, but no pony.

“Has anyone seen Stuffy Nose?” She asked. “He was just here a few moments ago.”

“He went to go to the bathroom, ma’am,” replied the colt in the next seat.

“Is he… sort of blue, with an orange mane?” Midnight asked, frowning.

“Yes,” Ms. Wormwood said. “Why do you ask?”

“I put him in time out.”

Stuffy Nose sniffled and looked down at the ground. The roof was awfully high up. Much too far to jump down from.
“Help!”

“I shouldn’t be the one who gets in trouble,” Midnight grumbled, as she spun a block around in her magic. No cookies at snacktime? Not even Celestia would be so cruel. “I was even really careful that I didn’t drop him.”

“Now,” Ms. Wormwood said. “Does anypony know the word we use to describe how much magic is in something?”

Twilight’s hoof raised a fraction of a second slower than Midnight’s.

“Midnight?”

“Thaums, short for Thaumaturgical Units,” she answered.

“That’s right. And do you know the average Thaum count of an adult unicorn?”

“Um…” She thought about Sunset. She was pretty strong. Maybe lower it by an order of magnitude? “Five thousand?”

“Five- no, no. That would be far above average.” Ms. Wormwood coughed. “Anypony else?”

“One hundred, exactly,” Twilight said, not waiting to get called on, too excited by the prospect of being right when her double was wrong.

“That’s correct. The Thaum was originally measured as one percent of the power of the average unicorn. Of course, now we have a more objective definition, but it’s useful to think of the original definition, as it’s still relevant today.”

She started lecturing on some point in the book. Midnight sighed, bored. She tried to follow along in her own copy, but the words were blurry and hard to focus on without it hurting her head. Midnight started drawing in her notebook, until her crayon broke. She frowned at it. She needed a blue one to finish Celestia’s mane… her eyes wandered over to Twilight’s desk. She still had a blue crayon. Midnight picked it up.

“Hey!” Twilight hissed, grabbing for the crayon. It wobbled in midair, directly between them. Their identically-colored auras roiled as they met and fought for control.

“Girls, no fighting,” Ms. Wormwood said. She reached for the crayon with a hoof and jolted back as a spark snapped at her hoof. “Oh no.”

The cloud of mana built up around the crayon, discontinuities in the magical field sending out more sparks. Ms. Wormwood was not an inexperienced teacher, and she had seen plenty of minor magical disasters. Most importantly, she knew how to stop them. She reacted quickly, throwing a Dispel effect at the crayon. It was strong enough to break the grip of even an adult unicorn.

It hissed as it hit the build-up of magic, evaporating like a drop of water on a red-hot skillet.

Ms. Wormwood felt sweat drip down her face. Her reflexes were, thankfully, excellent, and her desk was sturdy and had a lead lining to protect the contents against divination spells. She grabbed the crayon and threw herself behind the desk to shield the children from the impending explosion..

There was a puff of heat, smoke, and blue pigment as the crayon sublimated.

“I think it’s time for everypony to take a nap...” Ms. Wormwood groaned from under her desk.

Cadance walked into the school, looking around. Sometimes she felt like this was where she belonged instead of going to Canterlot High - she barely had control of her magic, and her education back home had been spotty at best. Of course it would also take about a century to regain any authority at all with the nobility if she went to kindergarten as an adult. High school was bad enough. She couldn't even be entirely honest about her age or else-

“Oh, Princess Cadance, what are you doing here?” Cadance’s train of thought derailed somewhere near self-pity junction. Her ears perked up when spotted Twilight Velvet among the other adults coming to pick up their foals.

“Celestia asked me to get Midnight. She had to send Sunset out of town to deal with something, and she knows I’m good with foals.”

“You don’t need to tell me,” Velvet smiled. “I know Twilight wishes you could babysit more often. It’s difficult finding somepony we can trust with her.”

“I’ll try to make some time. I miss her, too. Honestly, she’s a little easier to handle than Midnight. They may look the same, but all you need with Twilight is a new book and she’ll be quiet for hours. Midnight gets bored with books and wants to try things. It’s… a lot more hectic.”

“I’m sure she’s not that bad,” Velvet said, giggling.

“No, she’s actually very sensitive,” Cadance said. “And she’s so cute with Sunset.”

“Maybe the two of them could have a play date.”

“I’ll talk to Sunset about it,” Cadance agreed. The two quieted as they walked into the classroom. The lights were turned off, and the foals were lying in the back of the room under blankets.

“They’re so cute,” Velvet whispered. “I’m surprised they haven’t woken up.”

“Drowsy Hooves’ Daydream Hex,” Ms. Wormwood said, from where she sat at her desk, a bottle of something green and made with herbs keeping her company. She nodded to Twilight Velvet and Princess Cadance. In a classroom, a teacher had authority far exceeding that of royalty. “Possibly the only spell powerful enough to make foals actually sleep through naptime. They won’t wake up for another hour.”

“I’ll have to look that one up,” Velvet said.

“Yes. Now, if you’d please?” She gestured towards the foals. “It has been a very eventful day and I really need to get back home and get a shower.” She sighed and looked at her stained coat. “Blue really isn’t my color.”

Twilight groaned and rolled over in bed. It was oddly soft, and she felt like she was sinking into it. Even the sheets felt too smooth. She sat up, looking around blearily, the dreamless sleep clearing from her mind with the swift recovery that came with a sleep spell ending.

“I thought I’d have to wake you up for dinner,” said a voice that Twilight didn’t recognize. She rubbed at her eyes and focused on the voice. There was an orange mare with fire-like hair looking at her.

“What’s going on?” Twilight asked. It didn’t look like her room. There were a lot of strange things on the walls. They looked almost like… body parts. Her mind found the word after a moment. Taxidermy. She couldn’t even identify what she was looking at. A claw made of crystal. Jawbones from some kind of predator. Stuffed tentacles hung like party streamers.

“I just got back. I almost got stuck in the middle of nowhere looking for the Hidebehind. I literally had to run to catch the train, so I could use something to eat. I think it’s just sandwiches tonight. Cucumber for me and turkey for you. I'll tell you the story over dinner.”

“Turkey? Like the bird?!” Twilight’s eyes went wide with horror.

“I figured you deserved a special treat for your first day at school.” Sunset pulled the covers off of her. “We can trade stories about how our days went. You wouldn’t believe the thing Celestia had me fighting today.”

“I want to go home,” Twilight said.

“...What?”

“I said I want to go home!” Twilight repeated, louder.

“Midnight, what are you even talking about? The palace is home!”

“My name is Twilight Sparkle!” The filly started jumping in frustration on the bed. “Why am I here?! Is that copy trying to steal my parents again?!”

Sunset froze in place for a moment, then growled and opened the door, yelling down the hallway. “CADANCE! YOU GOT THE WRONG ONE!” With no reply forthcoming, Sunset slammed it shut and turned back to Twilight.

"So, sandwiches? I'll have one of the guards go and get your parents, but that might take a while and I'm sure you're hungry-"

"I don't want sandwiches! I want my mom!"

Twilight hopped off of the bed, moving with the scurrying speed possessed by all small, evasive animals. She shot right past Sunset and into the hallway beyond.

"Hold on!" Sunset yelled, trying to catch up. She was well-equipped both mentally and physically to pursue and take down monsters, but harmless fillies were an entirely new and more difficult type of prey. And you weren't allowed to set them on fire, which invalidated most of her strat

"No! You're not my mom! I want my mom!" She screamed, fleeing. Twilight spotted golden-armored ponies and ran for them. "Shiny?" She looked up at the guard. Close examination determined it was not her brother.

"What's going on?" The guard asked.

"She's trying to steal me away from my mommy!" Twilight wailed.

"Oh not this again," Sunset hissed, as royal guards closed in on her.

Midnight yawned and stretched, then frowned. The bed felt hard. She was used to sleeping on an enchanted cloud mattress, but this felt more like springs and fluff. Perfectly soft by a normal pony's standards, but Midnight had never lived by normal pony standards. The sheets were cotton instead of silk, warmer and more plush than slick.

In summary, it wasn't her bed. It still felt comfortable enough, but not what she wanted.

She sat up and looked around, remembering the lessons her mother had given her about staying calm in the face of the unknown. Instead of trophies from the various beasts Princess Celestia had tasked her mother with slaying for the good of Equestria, the walls were lined with bookcases. It was less like a bedroom and more like somepony had put a bed in a library.

"Remember the basics," Midnight said, starting a mental checklist to keep herself calm. "Survey the area, discounting nothing." There were papers and notebooks everywhere, and a small chalkboard with diagrams that she couldn't make out from the bed. next to the bed was a nightstand with three books and, more importantly, a photo.

Midnight picked it up and looked. It showed... well, her first thought was that it showed her standing with two ponies she didn't recognize. After a few moments, she remembered where she'd seen them before.

"Twilight Sparkle's parents," she said. "O-okay. So this must be her room. She must really like reading." Midnight frowned at that. She'd never liked reading. Books were too boring and blurry.

She got up and slid out of bed quietly.

"Which means... they must have gotten us mixed up after the nap." She sighed. "At least I'm probably not in trouble."

Midnight pulled at the doorknob with her magic. There was a crack as one of the hinges on the door broke free, making it swing open crookedly.

"Twilight? Is that you?" Asked a voice from downstairs. "Be careful with the door. We haven't had time to fix the hinge after the accident."

An accident? Did Twilight have those too? Midnight was always setting things on fire when she wasn't careful with her magic. Sunset said it was magical leakage because her spells weren't bound tightly enough.

Midnight followed the source of the voice to a small room on the ground floor, still walking as quietly as possible. Dance lessons had helped a little, but having to trot around on marble floors in big, echoing rooms had done more to teach her how to quiet her steps.

"Um..." Midnight pushed the door open with her nose, looking inside. Twilight's mother was sitting at a desk, typing and occasionally stopping to refer to hoof-written sheets. "Excuse me."

"What is it, dear?" Twilight Velvet asked, turning to look. She had reading glasses perched on her snout.

"I think I'm in the wrong place. I'm not your daughter." Midnight sighed. "C-can you please help me get back to the palace?"

"You're not..." Velvet sighed and rubbed her temple. "I'm so sorry. I should have known something like this would happen if we didn't wake you up at the school."

"I-it's okay," Midnight smiled nervously. "I-I just want to go home."

"We'll get you home, dear," Velvet smiled kindly and got up. "I'll have Night Light go to the castle and get this sorted out. He'll get your mother and have her pick you up, okay?"

"O-okay? Shouldn't I just go with him?"

"I'm an author, dear," Velvet said, nodding towards the typewriter. "And I can see a comedy of errors from a mile away. If I send you with him, I know ponies will miss each other and one of you will end up getting lost and this whole thing will become a huge mess."

"It will?" Midnight tilted her head.

"Mm." Velvet nodded. "And more importantly, when you get lost the best thing you can do is to stay where you are. You know why?"

Midnight shook her head.

"Because the ponies that care about you are going to come looking, and if you stay somewhere safe, they'll have an easier time finding you."

"I guess that makes sense..." Midnight said, quietly.

"Since you'll be our guest for a bit, why don't I get you some snacks and something to read?"

"Okay," Midnight said. "But, um. I don't like reading."

Velvet blinked as if physically struck. "What?"

"Reading is too hard," Midnight admitted. "It hurts my eyes."

"Hm..." Velvet considered, then took her reading glasses and put them on Midnight before levitating a few pages from next to her typewriter over to her. "What about now?"

"That's-" Midnight looked through the glasses, then took them off and squinted at the page before putting them back on. "That's amazing! Are these magic?"

"No, dear, just a moderately strong prescription," Velvet laughed. "Poor vision runs in the family. I'm sometimes surprised Twilight hasn't blinded herself with how much she reads in poor light."

"So I'm not even a good copy..." Midnight muttered.

"Don't say that. You're a cute little filly. And glasses might make it a little easier to tell you two apart. They look adorable on you."

Midnight blushed at the praise.

"Would you like to see what I'm working on?" Velvet asked. "Nopony else has seen it, so you'll be my very first reader."

"Really? What is it?" Midnight asked. Reading didn't seem so bad if it wasn't going to give her headaches.

"A mildly dramatized retelling of my teenage years. I call it 'Twilight's Bizarre Adventure'. I might rename it 'Velvet Underground', though. Titles are always the hardest part of writing."

Twilight Sparkle glared as she walked next to her father, Sunset Shimmer trailing behind them and nursing a few bumps to the head and cursing herself for being too nice for her own good. Next time she'd just throw the guards into the sun and let Celestia sort it out.

"Twilight, please calm down," Night Light said. "It was an honest mistake."

"She's just trying to steal you away from me!" Twilight huffed. "I'm not gonna let her take my parents."

"Sure, and next she'll steal your horn," Sunset muttered, rolling her eyes.

"Can she do that? Is it some kind of dark magic?!" Twilight looked at Sunset, eyes wide with terror. "I bet you taught her! You've got all those monster parts!"

"They're trophies," Sunset said, defending herself. "It's traditional."

"Traditional for who?" Twilight asked. "Evil witches?"

"Monster hunters. It's what I do." Sunset raised her chin.

"The Royal Guard hunts monsters," Twilight corrected her.

"They hunt little weak monsters," Sunset counter-corrected. "I hunt the ones that the Royal Guard can't handle. It's a long list."

Twilight huffed and turned away, hunching her shoulders and stomping towards her house.

"Careful," Night Light whispered. "Her brother is planning on joining the Royal Guard. She doesn't like it when ponies speak poorly about the Guard."

"I might be nicer if they hadn't just tried to bludgeon me," Sunset retorted. Tried being the operative word. They'd almost certainly make a full recovery.

Twilight almost tore the front door apart as she rushed into her home, eyes darting from shadow to shadow, hoping to spot the imposter before it saw her. Her sensitive ears twitched at the sound of hooves on hardwood, and Twilight ran towards her mother's office, bursting through the half-open door.

"Mom!" Twilight yelled, in a panic. "Don't let her steal your horn!"

Two confused gazes settled on the filly, who was panting from the exertion that came with being on the edge of a panic attack for an hour.

"I'm glad you’re home, Twilight, but really? Steal my horn?" Velvet laughed warmly. "That sounds like something I'd put in one of my stories."

"You don't understand!" Twilight yelled. "She's evil!" She pointed at Midnight and gasped. "She already stole your glasses! And your story! Give those back!"

"Twilight, I gave those to her," Velvet said, trying to calm her down before this turned into another one of the ironically-named and historically interesting craters that were scattered around Canterlot (most of them near Celestia's School for Gifted Unicorns).

"Why would you do that?!" Twilight yelled.

"Because she needs them to read, dear," Velvet said, running her hoof through Twilight's mane. The over-excited filly started to calm down, pressing against her mother protectively.

"Why didn't you ever tell me you needed glasses?" Sunset asked, as she entered the room. It hadn't been hard to follow Twilight, since she just needed to walk towards the screaming.

"I didn't know," Midnight mumbled, blushing.

"They look good on you, squirt," Sunset smirked, trotting over to nuzzle her. "And I see she's been spoiling you with cookies."

"They're really tasty," Midnight said, offering one to Sunset. Before Sunset could take it, Twilight jumped between them, grabbing the treat and jumping on it like she was wrestling a dangerous artifact away from some evil overlord.

"Those cookies were supposed to be for me and Shiny!" Twilight yelled.

"Twilight, that's quite enough," Velvet said. "I won't have you being rude to our guests! Please go to your room."

"But Mom!" Twilight gasped in shock. Had her copy already started controlling their minds?

"No buts," Velvet said, firmly. "You can come back down after they've gone, and we'll talk about your behavior."

Twilight stomped towards the stairs, pausing only to glare back at her doppelganger. Humiliated, defeated, hungry, all these things and more, Twilight knew there was only one thing that was going to make her feel better.

Revenge.

And cookies.

Chapter 5

Sunset took cover under a pine tree (or a fir, or some other evergreen - she'd never been able to tell the difference between them) and shook the snow from her mane. Her winter cloak's outer layers were heavy and sodden from melting frost, but the inner lining of pegasus down was still keeping her warm.

She hated the cold. It made her hooves hurt and she always worried she'd end up with frostbite. It also brought back too many bad memories.

Freezing, with only a moth-eaten blanket to protect her, sitting in a closet just to get away from the other foals. A tiny flame, barely a candle's worth, hovering in front of her face.

Sunset shook her head, ears folding back as she tried to drive off the images. This was not a good time to dwell on things. The thick clouds made the whole valley feel almost timeless in a sort of cold, gray way. Dark was falling and snow was falling faster, and she wasn't going to spend a night in the woods. Not with what she'd been sent out here to hunt.

After getting her bearings with a map, compass, and a frustrating dead-end gulley, she'd finally spotted the town she had been trying to reach for the last two hours. The road between the train station and the isolated hamlet was probably easy to follow most of the year, but as soon as a few fresh inches of snow had dropped, the winding path through the forest had become as anonymous as the rest of the woods.

Sunset had veered off of it badly. She wasn't sure if she'd ended up following an old creek bed or a game trail, but she'd lost a lot of time following it, and the snow storm had made it impossible to trace her path back, her hoofprints being covered up only a few minutes after she made them.

Next time, she was going to try and find a monster somewhere warmer. Maybe a tropical island. They had monsters there, right? Maybe she'd even take Midnight along to show her the ropes and give her a little vacation. Fight some giant crabs, go sunbathing, get some drinks with little umbrellas in them, that kind of fun trip. Anything without snow and ice.

The thought kept her warm as she stomped into town. The flurries were starting to turn into sleet, which was making the trek even less pleasant.

She pushed open the door to the local inn and shook herself like a dog before casting a few drying spells. Between that and the fire roaring in a pit in the middle of the inn, complete with a cauldron over it, Sunset was starting to feel better already.

"I don't suppose I can get some coffee and hot food," Sunset asked, sitting at the bar. The mare behind the bar frowned until she put a few bits on the counter. Gold always turned a grimace into a grin.

"Is barley soup okay?" The mare asked, walking over to the cauldron. She hung a kettle next to it and opened the cast-iron lid of the pot. What was inside looked mostly like off-white mush, but Sunset could see hints of something more colorful along with it. More importantly, it smelled heavenly.

"Sure," Sunset agreed. When the soup was in front of her she felt even better about the decision. Carrots, onion, and what looked like green tomatoes were mixed in with it, and she dug in while she waited for her coffee.

The bowl was already half-empty when the mug was poured and set before her.

"Thanks," Sunset said. "So, I hear you've got a little bit of a monster problem around her." She sipped at the black coffee. It tasted like it had been cut with something. Maybe chicory.

"Maybe. But I don't know how you heard that on account of how we don't get many visitors." She gestured around the empty inn.

"You say that, but you've still got a pot of soup on," Sunset pointed out.

"I have to eat too," the mare shrugged. "And the woodcutters come in here for lunch. Or they used to before..." She frowned, looking away.

"Before what?" Sunset pressed, draining the rest of her coffee and staring at the mare intently.

"Before ponies started disappearing," she finished, whispering. "It's bad luck to talk about it."

As if on cue, a howl pierced the air.

"Oh Celestia save us," the mare said, cowering.

"Celestia couldn't make it," Sunset said, pushing the now-empty soup bowl away from herself. She smirked. Now it was time to make a dramatic speech. "But she did send-"

"Princess Cadance!" The mare gasped.

"Who what now?" Sunset asked, blinking and turning around as she felt a wash of cold air over her back.

The pink princess was standing in the doorway, fluttering her wings and shivering. Sunset glared at her. This was not how this was supposed to go.

"What are you doing here?" Sunset demanded, standing and facing Cadance. The Princess waved, still shivering, and walked over to the fire, almost collapsing.

"It is very, very cold outside," Cadance said, through chattering teeth.

"I thought alicorns were supposed to be tough?" Sunset snorted. "You didn't even bring a coat."

"I assumed, wrongly, that my pegasus magic would be strong enough to protect me without more layers," Cadance said.

"You mean you saw that Celestia never wears a coat and thought you could get away with it too," Sunset corrected.

"That too," Cadance admitted, more quietly.

"You can have my coat, your highness!" The mare behind the bar pulled a flannel and wool jacket from a hook on the wall. Sunset suppressed a growl. She'd had to pay in advance just to get coffee, and here this mare was, offering Cadance the clothing off her back (almost literally) just because she was a princess.

It was the kind of thing that made Sunset want to solve the monster problem by just setting the whole valley on fire.

"So, again, why the buck are you here?" Sunset demanded.

"I was worried about you," Cadance said.

"Worried about-" Sunset sputtered. "Why?"

"I just had a really bad feeling. I know you don't like me, but I couldn't let something happen to you."

"I can handle myself," Sunset said. "Tartarus, I can handle myself better than you can. Go back to Canterlot and hang out with that stallion you were seeing."

"This is more important," Cadance said, firmly.

"More important than your coltfriend?" Sunset raised her eyebrow.

"He's not-" Cadance sighed. "He's not really my coltfriend. We sort of started growing apart. I used to spend a lot of time foalsitting his sister, but you've needed more help with Midnight and-"

"Is this a guilt trip? Really?" Sunset frowned. "I get enough of those from Celestia. If that's what you're here for, you can find somepony else to bother. I'm here to have a nice, relaxing time and turn problems into craters."

"No, Sunset, you don't understand-"

"Help!" The scream carried over the wind, and put an end to the growing argument. Sunset ran outside, horn blazing with light. A stallion was pushing through the snow, his coat covered in soot and splinters.

"What happened?" Sunset asked, blinking in front of him in a flash of teal light. The stallion fell back, startled, and cowered from her.

"A monster!" He gasped, though it was unclear if he meant Sunset or what he was fleeing from.

"Great!" Sunset grinned. "Where is it?"

The stallion pointed back the way he came, shaking.

"Wonderful. Thank you for your assistance." She picked him up and, spotting Cadance, dropped him on her back. "Here. Make yourself useful and make sure he's not hurt."

"Wait!" The stallion yelled. "It's got my daughter!"

Sunset looked away. "I'll get her back." She started running, hoping she could keep her word.

The stallion's house wasn't hard to find. Or more accurately, it wasn't hard to find what was left of it. One of the walls had been torn out, and the roof had fallen into the fireplace, setting the whole thing ablaze. Sunset threw an extinguishing spell over it, the flames almost instantly smothering to nothing.

With her horn providing most of the light, she circled the house twice before finding what she wanted.

One of the logs that had been ripped free was still intact, and she could see the tooth marks on it. That meant it wasn't an incorporeal spirit like a windigo, or anything that would use claws or hands like a yeti. Not that yeti were ever seen this far away from Yakyakistan.

She stopped as she found a pawprint in the snow, shielded from the driving winds and falling sleet by part of the collapsed roof. It was a miracle it hadn't melted yet, but it had enough detail for her to tell what she was looking at, and it wasn't good news for anypony involved.

It was a wolf. Unfortunately, not something easy to deal with like a Timber Wolf. She'd half expected it to be one of the wooden elementals trying to get revenge on the woodcutters. No, this was the pawprint of a living creature, not a construct of fallen branches. And it was almost as wide as her shoulders.

"With the size and the cold... it has to be a winter wolf," she muttered. Not the most dangerous prey, except if you were on a time limit, in a blizzard, at night. A lack of preparation was the easiest way to turn a simple monster hunt into a lingering death.

It did give her some hope, though. Winter wolves didn't eat living prey. They dragged ponies into the woods and chased them until they froze to death, then... consumed them after they'd frozen solid.

Sunset shivered. But only because with the fire from the burning house extinguished, the wind was starting to get to her again. That was definitely the only reason.

She held her breath and closed her eyes, listening. It couldn't have happened that long ago, and sound was going to be easier to follow than trying to look blindly for the foal, especially in the growing darkness. If the wind was blowing the right way, sound would carry a long way in this kind of winter air.

"Sunset!" Cadance yelled, completely breaking her concentration. Sunset turned on her angrily as the princess touched down, flapping her wings to shake off the ice before settling them underneath her borrowed coat.

"I don't want or need your help," Sunset said, trying to keep her voice civil.

"But that missing filly might," Cadance retorted, with more edge in her voice than Sunset was used to hearing.

Sunset bit back a retort. "I don't have time to argue with you. Do whatever you want." She turned away and guessed at a direction. Gut instinct told her that the wolf had probably picked the side of the house closest to where it had come from, and would have gone back in that direction.

She stomped through the snow, her horn casting a beam of blue-green light that she swept over the woods.

"Do you think the filly is still..." Cadance trailed off. Sunset glanced back at her, growing even more annoyed when she saw that the princess was somehow standing on top of the snow, her hooves barely even marking the top layer.

"Yes," Sunset said. "But only for a few hours at most."

"Why would a monster attack ponies? There has to be easier prey."

Sunset stopped, trying to decide which way to go. "Ponies, especially foals, aren't equipped to survive the cold on our own. Winter wolves can only eat frozen meat. Most animals in environments like this can survive just fine on the coldest winter night, so they have to find prey that will die of... natural causes."

"And it just decided to start attacking the town now?" Cadance asked.

"They hibernate in permafrost during the summer. Wood cutters might have opened up a path that led it to town. Before that, it was probably either wandering or eating hibernating animals. They collapse caves and burrows where other animals are sleeping and wait for them to suffocate and freeze."

"That's awful," Cadance muttered. "How do you know all this?"

"It's my job," Sunset hissed. "Just like your job is to be Celestia's favorite and sit at her side and smile and wave."

"You're not being fair," Cadance said.

"And you're out of your element," Sunset argued. "Shut up and let me concentrate." She picked a direction at random and closed her eyes, listening.

Just on the edge of her hearing, there was something. A scream, maybe. It was so faint it could have been nothing but the wind.

"That way," she muttered, following the ghost of a sound, trying to run through the thick snow.

"Are you sure?" Cadance asked. "I think there's a lake that way. I saw it when I was flying through the storm."

"A lake... of course." Sunset groaned. "It's probably going to chase them into the water. They'll freeze to death in minutes instead of hours!" She ran ahead, teleporting past undergrowth as she galloped, appearing and disappearing in bursts of cyan light.

The screams grew louder, and the treeline thinned as they reached the lake Cadance had mentioned. A filly stumbled out of the woods a few dozen paces away, falling on her face as she tripped over knee-high rocks and ice.

"There she is!" Cadance gasped, flying over Sunset towards the foal and picking her up. The brush behind her erupted into movement, and a wolf as big as Celestia with fur the icy blue of a snow-covered glacier appeared from near-invisibility in the wintery woods.

Cadance covered the foal with her wings and braced herself, knowing this was going to hurt. There was an impact as something slammed into her, throwing her and the foal to the side. Something scorched her feathers a moment later, and there was a whimper and another series of crashes through the woods, fading into the distance.

"You idiot," Sunset hissed. Cadance opened her eyes. She'd been tackled out of the way, and given that there was a clear cone where the woods had been set on fire, she had a good guess as to what Sunset had done to drive the monster off. The fiery mare was still on top of her, looking into the woods.

"What happened?" Cadance asked, as Sunset got up, stumbling away from her.

"You got in the way!" Sunset yelled. "If you'd waited another second or two we would have had it out in the open and I could have blasted it before it knew we were there! It only attacked because you tried to make off with its dinner!"

"But the filly-"

"Would have been fine! They only eat frozen meat! She's just cold and scared," Sunset said. "Get her back to town."

"What are you going to do?"

"What do you think I'm going to do?" Sunset snorted. "I'm going to finish what I started."

Cadance carried the filly back to town, clutching the shivering foal to her chest. The flight back was considerably faster than tracking the monster through the woods, even with the sleet still coming down.

"Aurora!" Gasped the stallion, as Cadance walked through the doors. The filly hopped down and ran for her father, nuzzling him. "I knew you could save her, Princess."

Cadance sighed feeling relieved. At least she was safe.

"Princess, are you hurt?" Asked the innkeep, concerned. Cadance blinked, surprised by the question.

"No, no, I'm fine," Cadance said.

"But-" The innkeep touched Cadance's side, her hoof coming away stained with dark red. Cadance took off the coat just to make sure she hadn't been injured without noticing, but the blood hadn't even soaked through.

"It's not mine," Cadance said. Then her brain caught up to what she was seeing. It wasn't hers, but that was where Sunset had pushed her. No, where she'd shielded Cadance with her own body.

It was Sunset's blood, and she was still out in the woods with that monster.

"No no nononono..." Cadance whispered. "I have to go!" She ran outside, without the coat. She didn't care about the cold right now.

Sunset leaned against a boulder, trying to catch her breath. She was light-headed, dizzy, and probably going to pass out in a few minutes, but at least the winter wolf wasn't going to be a problem anymore. Where it had stood was a crater big enough to drop a house into, still smoking with residual heat.

The wind whipped between the trees, chilling Sunset to the bone.

She would have crawled towards the nice, warm hole in the ground, but her hooves didn't want to cooperate. She wasn't even sure she could stand up any more. To be honest, she'd been supporting herself with magic for a few minutes already, but with her concentration failing, even that was getting too difficult.

"I really hate the cold..." Sunset trailed off without completing the thought, collapsing to the ground in a heap and groaning.

"Sunset!" Cadance yelled, from somewhere above.

Sunset groaned louder, not because she wanted to be found but because Cadance had the worst timing. She was just starting to get comfortable and fade into unconsciousness, but now she'd have to deal with a panicking pink princess.

"Oh thank Harmony!" Cadance gasped, landing near her. "I didn't think I'd find you, but then I saw this big flash and-"

"Go away," Sunset croaked.

"You're hurt," Cadance said. She lifted Sunset's cloak and immediately put it back down. "Really hurt! We need to get you to the hospital!"

"Oh wonderful," Sunset said, hissing through her teeth. "Then all the ponies there can talk about how great Princess Cadance is, and how she, alone, defeated a horrible monster and saved Celestia's worthless student."

"I-it's not like that," Cadance whispered. "I just want to help."

Sunset felt a surge of energy, and managed to open her eyes and glare at Cadance. "You think I don't bucking know that?! It has nothing to do with you! Everypony just loves you. You're beautiful and nice and polite..." Sunset coughed and set her head back down on the ground. "And you don't even have to do anything, and they like you. It's not fair."

"Sunset..." Cadance whimpered.

"You just had to beat one monster, and Harmony itself said 'good enough, alicorn time.'" Sunset pointed at her with a shaky hoof. "Do you know how many monsters I put down? Almost fifty so far! I've saved hundreds of ponies. And I don't get anything for it. You know what's going to happen here? In a week nopony will even remember I was here. They'll just talk about you."

Cadance sat next to her, not sure what to do.

Sunset laughed. "I'm just so tired, Cadance."

"I didn't know," Cadance whispered. "I mean, I knew you were- that you were jealous. Or envious. Or both, I guess. Then there's the way the Celestia talks about you..."

"I'm sure she has plenty of complaints," Sunset snorted.

"All she ever talks about is how much potential you have. She's willing to send you out to fight monsters and recover artifacts... and she doesn't even trust me to talk to diplomats without her holding my hoof."

"Let's be honest, Cadance. She wouldn't want me to talk to diplomats either." Sunset laughed.

Cadance smiled a little. "Only because you'd scare them too much. If we put you in a room alone with the Griffonstone ambassador, the whole place would be annexed in a day."

"Or on fire," Sunset offered. "I'm really good at setting things on fire."

"Or on fire," Cadance agreed. "Now let's get you to a hospital. Please?"

"F-fine," Sunset sighed. "But only because I don't want Midnight growing up knowing I got killed by anything less than a dragon."

Cadance tried to pick Sunset up with her magic, and found it surprisingly difficult. It took almost all of her strength just to get her off the ground. She braced herself for the weight as she set Sunset down between her wings and-

And nothing. She didn't feel like she was made of lead. Maybe a little heavier than the average unicorn, but nothing Cadance's earth pony strength couldn't manage.

She'd have to solve that mystery another day. She spread her wings and started towards the nearest hospital.

Cadance paced back and forth. Her wings still ached from the flight. It would have been hours away by train to the nearest town big enough to have a real hospital. She'd had to fly against the storm just to get to the small clinic the locals had pointed her towards.

Even so, Sunset had passed out partway there. And the doctor had tried to ignore the wounded unicorn so he could treat Cadance's bruises.

“What’s taking so long?” Cadance whispered, worried. She’d left the room so the doctor could focus more on what he was doing instead of constantly trying to please her.

“Princess?” Asked a nurse, timidly. “I’m sorry. There’s nothing we can do.”

“What?!” Cadance paled, running through the door. “She wasn’t hurt that badly!”

The doctor, an older unicorn, was standing next to Sunset’s bed. He looked up as Cadance entered and bowed.

“Princess Cadance,” he said. Cadance looked at Sunset. Her barrel was wrapped in bandages, and she was breathing shallowly.

“Why haven’t you-” Cadance swallowed. She wasn’t going to get anywhere if the doctors were cowering and apologizing. “What’s wrong? Her injuries didn’t seem that… severe, and she’s still alive.”

“We don't keep donated blood here, and we don't have a surgical team. Normally, for an injury like this, we’d use a few different spells to close the wound, replace the blood loss, and promote healing until they could be transferred to a larger facility,” the doctor said, as he stood. “But it’s just impossible in this case. The spells are failing because of her high thaumic pressure. I was being quite literal when I said there's nothing we can do.”

“...Please explain like I don’t know anything about magic.”

“Well…” the doctor frowned. “You just flew here through that storm. You know how much harder it is to fly against the wind?”

Cadance nodded.

“Imagine trying to fly into a hurricane. That’s what it’s like trying to cast magic on this filly.” The doctor sighed. “Every spell we try is trying to fight against her own aura and we’re losing.”

“I’ve never heard of anything like that…” Cadance frowned.

“Every living creature has a magical aura. It’s why spells that affect objects and ones that affect living creatures have different… rune patterns…” he trailed off when he saw Cadance wasn’t following him. “I apologize, Princess. I’m explaining it poorly. The important thing is, this is an unusual case. There must be something wrong with her that we can’t explain, because the only other way she could have intrinsic thaumatic pressure like this is if she had literally hundreds of times more power than the average unicorn.”

“Something like that, yes,” Cadance muttered. “So you just need more power?”

“Yes, unfortunately, there’s no way we can get a specialist out here before morning. The only one here who might be able to help is… you.” He looked up at her hopefully.

“I don’t know any healing spells,” Cadance said, softly. “But I’m willing to learn.”

Sunset groaned and opened her eyes, blinking at the bright rays of sunlight that had disturbed her rest. She felt like somepony had thrown her under a train.

“What happened?” Sunset asked, putting a hoof over her eyes to shield them from the light.

“Ugh…” Cadance moaned. “Do you know how hard it is to keep a spell going for eight hours? I feel like my head is going to explode.”

“Eight hours?” Sunset blinked slowly, her eyes adjusting to the light. Cadance had bags under her eyes, the magic around her horn pulsing with the characteristic wavering aura of an exhausted caster.

“That’s a stabilization spell.” Sunset whispered.

“It was close. It took me a few tries to get it right.” Cadance smiled. “I was… I was really afraid that I’d mess this up, too.”

“I’m amazed that worked,” Sunset said, after a moment to gather herself. She tried to get up, giving up after the bandaged wounds in her side protested a little too much. “That spell is rudimentary. And your technique is crap.”

“It was all the doctor could teach me in time,” Cadance sighed. “I don’t really know a lot of spells.”

“You should fix that.” Sunset said.

“I should,” Cadance agreed. She nervously prodded the bed with her hoof, trying to think of the best way to say what she wanted to say. “I was hoping you could teach me.”

“Me?” Sunset scoffed, laughing. “Why?”

“Because we should be friends,” Cadance said. “I know Princess Celestia would approve.”

“Of course she would,” Sunset snorted. “She’d love it. So you’re just doing this for her approval?”

“Sunset, did you mean what you said in the forest? About me?” Cadance stopped pawing at the bed to look her in the eye. “You said that I was beautiful and nice and… well, a few other things while we were flying here.”

“I don’t remember saying anything else,” Sunset frowned.

“You were really out of it,” Cadance giggled. “But you remember the first part?”

Sunset shrugged. “Go ask the doctor if you want a second opinion.”

“You’re the first pony to say it to me where I felt like you really meant it,” Cadance said. “Without trying to please me, or buttering me up before making some request. I don’t think anypony has ever tried to make compliments sound quite so much like insults.”

“Are you hitting on me? Is that what this is?” Sunset raised an eyebrow.

“I’m saying that we can work together. I want to learn magic. I know you haven’t given up on becoming a princess. If you help me learn magic, I’ll do everything in my power to teach you how to become a princess.”

“So what, sitting somewhere and waving?” Sunset asked, weakly.

“I can also give you some makeup tips, and preening advice.”

“I don’t think preening will help me much.”

“You might be surprised. If you ever have a special pegasus in your life, it can really make things… pleasant.” Cadance grinned widely.

Sunset’s cheeks burned. “I’m going to pretend you didn’t say that.” She huffed and closed her eyes, trying to regain her focus. “Fine. But I warn you - I can be a difficult taskmaster. I expect excellence from all of my students.”

“How intimidating. I think I can handle it.”

“Then welcome to my world, Princess Cadance.” Sunset’s horn started glowing. “Go get some rest. I can maintain the healing spells on myself.”

“But-”

“Lesson one,” Sunset said. “Always listen to the pony with more experience. That’s me. Get some rest.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Cadance smiled. “Scoot over. I’ll just rest here so you can wake me if you need something.”

“Already trying to get in bed with me?” Sunset raised an eyebrow. She moved over to give Cadance some room.

“I’m just using you for your mattress,” Cadance yawned, settling down next to her on the thin padding. She quickly passed out, the exhaustion catching up with her as soon as she started to relax. Sunset blushed as the Princess nuzzled closer to her as she slept. It was a little closer than she wanted to be to the alicorn.

But at least she was warm and more comfortable than the bed.

Sunset sighed and leaned into her. She’d complain later. For now, at least she was alive.

Chapter 6

Midnight didn't feel much like herself.

As her name might suggest, she wasn't a morning pony, especially not when her mother wasn't around to drag her out of bed. Instead, she'd gone off on yet another monster-hunting mission and left Midnight behind. Usually she was back before morning, but this time Midnight had been woken up by one of the maids and left to her own devices.

Consequently, she'd totally forgotten to bring the spellbook she'd wanted to study during the free period at the end of the day. Of course, that was a distant worry, hours away. Instead, she was now lamenting that she'd only had oatmeal for breakfast - the maids weren't quite up to the task of getting bacon in the morning that wasn't made of smoked hay.

"...and that's why Clover the Clever was considered one of the greatest sorcerers of the age, despite her lack of formal training and only knowing a dozen spells." Ms. Wormwood smiled. "It goes to show you that even if you don't have a lot of power, knowing how to use it can take you far."

Midnight rolled her eyes. She had a feeling that this lecture was being directed at her. There had been another incident yesterday. She wasn't sure what the big deal was - sure, she hadn't gotten the spell exactly right, but it wasn't every day that you saw a rainbow that started at purple and went to octarine and hyperviolet!

The screaming had definitely been an overreaction. Nopony had been (permanently) blinded.

"Now, I'm sure that all of you are looking forward to your weekend," Ms. Wormwood said. "But learning never ends. I'm assigning each of you a research project due in one week."

Midnight groaned and put her head down on her desk.

"You're going to work in pairs and research a famous spellcaster of your choice, then present a report on their life and a demonstration of one of their spells for the class."

Ms. Wormwood paused and looked significantly at Midnight and Twilight.

"You may not choose anything involving dark magic, chaos magic, necromancy, double chaos magic, apocalypse magic, or anything that has the potential to open a gate to Tartarus."

"Yes, Ma'am," Midnight sighed. She started thinking about who she could use as a partner. She didn't know any of the fillies or colts very well, but they didn't know her, either.

"In the interest of fairness, I made a list of assigned partners. First, Lucky Swirl and Firecracker Burst..."

Midnight looked around the room as ponies were paired off with each other. She just had to hope she wasn't put with somepony useless or disaster prone like Lemon Hearts. She still wasn't sure how Lemon Hearts had gotten her head stuck in her lunchbox on the second day of class.

"...Twilight Sparkle and Midnight Twinkle..."

Midnight blinked. No. That couldn't possibly be right. She raised her hoof, at the same moment Twilight came to an almost identical conclusion and raised her own.

"Ma'am, we can't possibly-" Twilight started, at the same time as Midnight.

"-work together." Midnight finished. She turned to glare at Twilight. Was she copying her on purpose?

"Your groups can't be changed," Ms. Wormwood said. "This isn't just a lesson on famous unicorns, it's a lesson on how to work together. I expect all of you to make an honest effort on this."

"Okay, look," Twilight said, looking cautiously at her duplicate. They had a sheet of paper between them with a list of ideas that the teacher had given the glass. "Star Swirl is probably the most famous spellcaster of all time. We should choose him. There are lots of books about his life."

"That's exactly why we shouldn't choose him," Midnight argued. She tapped the list with her hoof. "He's right at the top of the list. Half the class is probably going to do Star Swirl or Clover the Clever. We should pick somepony more exciting."

"Star Swirl is exciting!"

"It's not gonna be exciting if ten other fillies are doing reports on him too. It's just gonna be the same report over and over again."

"Well, we could pick somepony further down the list. There's Silver Tongue, or Crystal Wishes, or-"

"Let's do a report on Grogar!" Midnight said, grinning. "He was an evil necromancer that enslaved ponies with these magical bells and-"

"No necromancy," Ms. Wormwood said, as she walked past them.

"Ugh," Midnight groaned. "Stupid rules."

"Well... there are still a lot of ponies that aren't on this list," Twilight said. "We could do a report on my mom."

"If we did a report on my mom it would be better," Midnight countered.

"But my mom has books about her life," Twilight retorted. "So we can use them for reference."

"And we could just ask my mom about her super exciting life! She hunts monsters! I bet she designed tons of awesome spells we could learn!"

"My mom told me about Sunset Shimmer," Twilight frowned. "If we tried casting any of her spells we'd probably blow up the school and get in a lot of trouble."

"Yeah, well..." Midnight didn't have an argument against that one. "But my mom could beat up your mom!"

"No fighting," Ms. Wormwood said, as she circled back around the two fillies. It was almost like she was staying near them to head off disaster before it could start. But instead of almost being like that, it was exactly what she was doing.

"Okay, look, let's compromise," Twilight sighed. "If we pick somepony on the list, it should definitely be fine, right?"

"That's fair, okay," Midnight nodded. "But how do we choose?"

"I read in a book on game theory that the most fair way to choose in a situation like this is drafting. Each of us will take turns eliminating names from the list until only one remains. You don't want to do Star Swirl, so we'll cross that off first." Twilight struck through the name with her quill. "And I don't want to do a report on Farrier Blitz. It would be too hard to demonstrate his theories on the magical properties of earth pony hooves."

The two went down the list, taking names off one at a time, Twilight growing more and more annoyed with Midnight with every question about the famous historical figures.

"How could you not have ever heard of Nazca Line?" Twilight huffed. "She was a famous diviner! She practically invented the field of remote viewing!"

"That sounds boring," Midnight said, rolling her eyes. "Cross her off the list."

"That only leaves Princess Platinum," Twilight said.

"Then we'll do a report on her," Midnight shrugged. "I guess it's not the worst choice. She's in the Hearth's Warming play, right?"

"Yeah," Twilight nodded. "But that's not entirely historically accurate."

"It shouldn't be hard to find something," Midnight shrugged, waving a hoof dismissively. "If she's on the list then there'll be enough to go on."

"We'll need to go to the library," Twilight said. "Ms. Wormwood will let us go during the free period after snacktime."

"Is that where you always go?" Midnight asked.

"Of course," Twilight said, rolling her eyes. "What else am I going to do, sit here on my flank and play with blocks? Books are way better as entertainment and building material."

Twilight ran her hoof down the page of the book she was reading as she went over the contents, her lips moving silently as she read to herself. In the corner of her eye, she saw Midnight open a book from the pile she'd carefully selected, flip through a few pages quickly, then discard it as useless.

Twilight's ear twitched as Midnight did it again. And again.

"Stop that!" Twilight hissed. "You're not even reading them!"

"I'm skimming them," Midnight shrugged. "These are dumb books." She pushed the glasses up further on her muzzle. Seeing them made Twilight's ear twitch again. They were her mother's glasses, and she'd just given them to the- the impostor.

"They're not dumb books," Twilight said, struggling to remain calm. "These books are listed in the index as the sources that the book on the history of Hearth's Warming used."

Midnight held up one of the books. "This is a book of foal's stories, Twilight. We can't use this."

"My mom always says that a story like that has a kernel of truth," Twilight said. "And... they don't really have a lot of more advanced books here."

Midnight picked up one of the other books she'd put aside. "And this one is a picture book about an evil caribou trying to steal the Hearth's Warming Flame."

"S-so maybe they're not all entirely historically accurate," Twilight admitted, blushing. "But even if it's almost entirely fiction, we can still mention it."

"Do we have any books here that aren't from the fiction section?" Midnight asked.

"It's from almost two thousand years ago," Twilight sighed. "All the records are from oral histories, passed down from generation to generation."

"Maybe we should have done the report on Mazda whatever instead."

"Nazca Line, and it's too late for that now, we've got all this research to do."

"But we need to cast a spell, too, not just retell the story of Hearth's Warming," Midnight pointed out. "And no offense, but Rudolph the Red-Winged Griffon isn't exactly a spellbook."

"Well, I did find some spell diagrams in this book-" Twilight held it up, and it was immediately yanked away from her.

"That's more like it," Midnight said. "Is there anything cool?"

"Be careful!" Twilight snapped. The librarian looked up and shushed her. Twilight's ears flattened back and she continued in a harsh whisper. "You can't be rough with books! They're fragile!"

"It's just a book," Midnight said, quickly flipping through the pages. "These spells are all kind of boring."

"But they're also safe," Twilight said. "Remember what Ms. Wormwood said? No necromancy, dark magic, chaos magic-"

"I remember," Midnight said. "It's just kind of weird. This is a spell for animating a small doll."

"My mom used to cast that on our Hearth's Warming dolls," Twilight said. "And Shining Armor used it on his action figures."

"Action figures?"

"They're like dolls, but for colts," Twilight said. "Shining Armor was very clear that I should always use the correct terminology."

"Well, I guess we can try that," Midnight sighed. "It looks simple. I just need a doll to test it on..." She started looking around. "I bet it'd work on a table."

"No, it's for dolls," Twilight said, firmly.

"The library table has four legs, like a doll, and it's made of wood. It's basically the same." Midnight squinted as she looked at the diagram. "If we ride a table into the classroom we'll definitely get the top score!"

"No!" Twilight protested, trying to grab the book. Midnight almost lost her grip on it, and it hung in the air between them, being pulled first one way then the other. "We have to do the research first! You can't just cast spells without knowing exactly how they work!"

"You cast them to find out how they work!" Midnight said. "The best way to learn is by doing!"

"You'll get us in trouble!" Twilight yelled.

The librarian shushed them again. Fillies and colts who had largely been ignoring them started moving away, trying to get out of what they could instinctively tell was about to stop being an argument and start being a blast radius.

"Just read the picture books since you want to do research so badly, and I'll do this!" Midnight grunted, trying to get the book away from Twilight. There was a tearing, ripping sound, and the tome cleanly tore in half, the binding proving far weaker than that magic of either filly.

"No!" Twilight screamed, horrified. She knew that she was looking at the end of her life. This was the kind of thing that they put ponies in jail for. Even the worst criminals in history wouldn't have torn a book in half - especially not a library book.

"What is going on here?" The librarian demanded, trotting over angrily. Twilight heard her gasp, and closed her eyes. What would her parents say, when they found out her daughter had been sent to Tartarus? They'd be upset at first, but after they found out about her crime, even they would have to agree that it was the only appropriate punishment.

"She did it!" Midnight immediately said. Twilight's eyes snapped open.

"What?!" Twilight demanded.

"Is that true?" The librarian asked, holding up both parts of the ruined book.

"It's-" Twilight looked down. She couldn't bring herself to lie. "It's my fault. I should have let go when I felt her pulling."

Midnight looked relieved for a moment until the librarian turned to her.

"Do you have anything to say for yourself?"

"N-no ma'am," Midnight said.

"Then both of you are banned from the library for a week," the librarian said. "And I'll be sending letters home to your parents, which you will return, signed, before you're allowed back in."

"A week?!" Twilight gasped. That was basically forever. "But- but the assignment is due before then!"

"You should have thought about that before roughhousing in the library," the librarian said. "Or at least you should have thought about something. Go back to your classroom. You can stay there until the school day ends."

"But-" Twilight said, standing up in alarm. Tears welled in her eyes.

"That isn't a suggestion," the librarian warned.

Twilight sniffled and walked out, head low. This was the worst day of her life.

“It was awful, Shiny!” Twilight wailed. “The sound when it died, the binding just failing and being torn apart as if it was nothing! I never thought I’d see death at such a young age.”

“It was just a book, Twily,” Shining Armor said, while he scowled at the stove. He was sure it was turned on, but the pot of water he’d set out wasn’t boiling. What was he doing wrong? Watching a pot didn’t actually keep it from boiling. That was a myth. Probably.

“You don’t understand!” Twilight said, pacing around the kitchen. “It was a library book! Now I’m a book-destroying criminal and everypony in the world is going to know! And you have the pot on the wrong burner.”

Shining Armor moved the pot to the other side of the stove, and steam started rising out of it almost immediately. “Thanks, Twily.”

“You know ponies in the Royal Guard, right? C-can you make sure that I get a nice prison cell when they come to arrest me?”

“Twilight, they’re not going to arrest you.” Shining Armor dropped pasta into the pot, along with spices, vegetable bouillon cubes, most of an onion, a few cloves of garlic, and two tomatoes he’d diced. “You’ll just have to go apologize later.”

“I’d arrest somepony who destroyed a book,” Twilight muttered.

“I know you would,” Shining Armor snorted. “That’s why we leave those decisions to the professionals. Besides, you just made a mistake. It wasn’t like you meant to destroy it, right?”

“No,” Twilight admitted, kicking at the floor.

“And a pony shouldn’t be blamed too much when there’s an accident,” Shining Armor smiled. “You just have to make things right. An apology and replacing the book are a good start for that.”

“Don’t forget to stir,” Twilight said. Shining Armor blushed and turned, quickly stirring the pot before anything could stick to the bottom and burn. “I just don’t understand how I’m supposed to work with… with that copy!” She huffed.

“If she’s really a copy of you, shouldn’t that make it easier?” Shining Armor asked, looking down at the filly. “I mean, she’d be almost as smart as you, right?”

“I don’t know,” Twilight shrugged. “She doesn’t know anything about history, or famous ponies, or anything like that.”

“And you don’t know anything about…” Shining Armor paused, trying to think of something. “Calculus?”

“That’s not fair! I just haven’t had a chance to learn it yet!” Twilight puffed out her cheeks. “I bet I could learn it if I wanted.”

“So give Midnight a chance to learn about history. That’s half the point of a research project, right? To learn new things.”

“I guess,” Twilight admitted.

Shining Armor stared at the stove. He could swear he was forgetting something.

“Put the spinach in,” Twilight said, cutting into his thoughts.

“Oh, right,” Shining Armor shook his head, grabbing the fresh spinach and tossing it into the almost-cooked pasta so it would have time to soften without turning to mush. “Why is it that I’m cooking instead of you?”

“Mom says I’m too young to cook on my own. Especially after I tried to use spells to make baking go faster.”

“Oh right,” Shining Armor said. “The oven had to be replaced.”

“It should have worked,” Twilight said. “I’ll get it right next time.”

“Well, until then, how about we have dinner? I think this is ready.” Shining Armor took the pot off the stove.

“Remember to add cheese on top!” Twilight said, hopping in place.

“I will, I will,” Shining Armor laughed. “Come on, and I’ll help you come up with a list of books after we eat. I bet your copy isn’t as good at checklists as you are.”

Midnight felt awful. She'd never really gotten in trouble before, at least not like this. It was one thing when her mother caught her sneaking cookies out of the kitchen (and to be fair, that had mostly been the baker's fault for letting her get away with it). That had been immediate and instant punishment, being put in time out while Sunset ate the cookies she'd liberated.

This was a sense of crawling dread, the knowledge that she was going to be punished draining the joy from everything. It might not be immediate, it might not even be today, but it was coming, lurking in the shadows to ambush her.

Midnight groaned and pushed open the door to the suite she shared with her mother. Normally, the apartment was perfectly quiet and still. Or filled with the low hum of restrained magical power, but only when Sunset was home and studying.

It was never, ever, a place where Midnight walked in to the sound of quiet whispers and giggling, and the rush of two ponies quickly increasing the distance between themselves as the door opened.

"Hey squirt," Sunset said, her cheeks pink. "I wasn't expecting you to be home so early at..." She glanced at the sundial hanging on the wall, which would have been a silly place for a sundial if it wasn't enchanted to show the correct time even at night. "The same time you always get out of school."

"Mom!" Midnight smiled and ran over to the couch where she was sitting, hopping up to hug her. The couch shifted under her hooves and she looked back.

Midnight blinked and looked at the pony sitting on the other end of the couch Sunset was occupying. Princess Cadance waved to her, though if she was blushing it was well hidden under her already-pink coat.

"Cadance got me home safely," Sunset said. "I had a little bit of trouble last night." She lifted her leg, showing Midnight the bandages wrapped around her body.

"A-are you okay?" Midnight asked, quietly.

"It was-" Sunset stopped and smiled. "I'm fine. No big deal. They just wanted to keep me overnight. Cadance kept me company."

"Oh," Midnight said. "But I thought you didn't like her."

"Well..." Sunset started, looking at Cadance.

"Sometimes, it takes effort to become friends with somepony," Cadance said. "But it can be worth it."

"Cadance is going to help me improve my image," Sunset said. Midnight tilted her head, confused.

"But you make really good illusion spells already."

"I mean... she's going to help me be a better pony? Make more friends? Something like that." Sunset shrugged.

"Also preening," Cadance put in.

"She is not teaching me preening," Sunset said, flatly, glaring over Midnight at the princess. "But she's going to teach me how to deal with politics and I'm going to teach her how to use her horn."

"I don't get it," Midnight said, frowning. "If you didn't like her before, why do you like her now? You can't just decide to be friends with somepony like Twi- like Cadance if they're mean to you."

"Is this about me and your mother, or about you and Twilight Sparkle?" Cadance asked.

"Both," Midnight muttered.

Cadance shimmied closer on the couch and put a hoof on Midnight's shoulder. "Do you want to know a secret?"
Midnight nodded.

"Most ponies are good, interesting people once you get to know them. The hard part is getting them to open up." Cadance smiled. "Twilight Sparkle, for example, is one of the hardest-working little fillies I ever met. When I used to foalsit for her, the difficult part was getting her to have some fun."

"All she ever does is yell at me," Midnight said. "She thinks she's so much better than me!"

"She's probably just scared," Cadance said. "Do you know why Twilight works so hard?"

Midnight thought for a moment. "Because she wants to be the best."

"That's not quite it." Cadance shifted, settling next to Midnight so the filly was sandwiched between her and Sunset. "Twilight has anxiety issues. She works hard because she doesn't handle things well if she doesn't feel prepared."

"But you can't have an answer for everything," Midnight said. "What if the teacher asks a question that isn't even in the book?"

"She's a very smart filly. Just like you." Cadance smiled. "So she can usually figure it out, if she doesn't overthink the problem. But there's one thing she hasn't had to deal with."

"What?" Midnight asked.

"She has never had to deal with a pony as smart as she is. She could get a perfect score with only a fraction of the effort she puts in, and that's the problem."

"How is that a problem?"

"Because test scores stop at a hundred," Sunset said. "I think I get what Cadance is saying. It's not like she can get a test score of a thousand percent, so if somepony else gets a perfect score, but they didn't study..."

"Then she thinks she needs to keep studying as hard as she does just to keep up?" Midnight asked.

"Exactly," Cadance agreed.

"I used to be the same way," Sunset admitted. "And I had the pressure of being the Princess's personal student. If I wasn't always proving I was the best, then I felt like I was failing her."

"But you are the best!" Midnight blurted out.

"That's what I thought, until I met Cadance," Sunset said. "There she was, with everything I ever wanted, and no magical talent to speak of. It made me angry enough that I started doing stupid things to try and get ahead. None of it ever worked. That's why we aren't or... weren't friends."

"But what am I supposed to do to get Twilight to not hate me? She's a big jerk! Because of her, I got in trouble at school and I still have to do an assignment with her even after she ripped a book in half because she didn't want me to have it!" Midnight huffed, pouting.

"You ripped a book in half?" Sunset asked.

"...And I might have been banned from the library for a week," Midnight muttered, putting her head down on the couch.

"She really does take after you," Cadance said, between giggles. "Celestia told me about how much property damage you used to cause."

"Laugh it up," Sunset growled. "Your first magic lesson is going to be shield spells while I take out some frustration on you."

"Scary," Cadance whispered, winking at Midnight.

"Am I grounded?" Midnight asked, quietly.

"Nah, I've got a worse punishment for you," Sunset grinned. "Since you're banned from the library, you and Twilight Sparkle are going to have to spend time with each other and work on your presentation. And you're going to be polite."

"Can't I just be grounded instead?"

"No. If I have to get along with Princess Heartbutt, you can deal with a classmate." Sunset snorted. "I mean you two should have a lot in common."

"Fine. But I'm only doing it because you're making me." Midnight rolled over to her side, flopping against Sunset.

"You'll thank me later- oh Stars I'm turning into Celestia." Sunset groaned. "Cadance! This is your fault!"

"Should I get you cake, your highness?” Cadance asked, before a pillow hit her in the face.

“Let them eat fluff,” Sunset said, raising her nose imperiously.

Chapter 7

Canterlot Castle. Twilight had been in the city almost her whole life and despite living in the shadow of the palace it was still, in a way, unreachable. She'd even built a scale representation of the Castle once (with as perfect accuracy as could be expected of an obsessive-compulsive unicorn using books as her construction medium) but it was only a model.

As she walked through the gates, Shining Armor at her side, Twilight was briefly annoyed to note that the courtyard wasn't quite as she'd modeled it. This would later result in a publishing house receiving several strongly-worded letters about the accuracy of their printed diagrams.

"Remember what I told you, Twily," Shining Armor said.

"I know, BBBFF. No going anywhere with strange ponies, no leaving the castle grounds, and if something happens I should tell the Royal Guards." Twilight rolled her eyes, adjusting the heavy saddlebags at her sides. She'd only been able to carry a half-dozen textbooks, and had to hope it was enough. There was no way Midnight was going to have any kind of reference on-hoof.

"Can't blame me for looking out for the cutest little sister I've got," Shining Armor smirked.

"That's a tautology, Shiny. I'm your only sister." Twilight frowned at him.

"Just because there's no competition doesn't mean you aren't cute." Shining Armor walked confidently into the hallways, Twilight following. After a few minutes of very self-assured trotting, he slowed and came to a stop at an intersection of two hallways.

"Hm..." Shining Armor looked one way, then the other.

"Are we lost?" Twilight asked. "I don't wanna be late!"

"We're not lost, exactly. I was taking us a faster way, but... I think this might actually not be where I thought I was going." Shining Armor smiled nervously. "It's fine. How hard can it be to find a library?"

"No," Twilight said, firmly.

"No?"

"That's what ponies always say before they get really, really lost. I read it in the Royal Guard survival manual." Twilight pointed. "There's somepony over there. Go ask them for directions."

"I have a great sense of direction," Shining Armor countered.

"What are you two doing in the servant's quarters?" Asked a very familiar voice.

Twilight turned around and found Princess Cadance smiling at her, a tray hovering at her side, grasped in her blue magic.

"Cadance!" Twilight yelled, happily, running over to her. "I haven't seen you in forever!"

"Has Shining Armor been getting you lost in the castle?" Cadance smiled.

"We're not lost," Shining Armor countered. "We're in the... servant's quarters."

"You only know that because I said it first," Cadance teased. "You're lucky. I was just grabbing some snacks for Midnight and Twilight's little study session."

"What kind of snacks?" Twilight asked.

"Sandwiches and some iced tea," Cadance said. "I know you two are going to end up forgetting to eat, so I wanted to get you something healthy."

"Could you take me to the library?" Twilight whispered. "I don't want Shiny to get lost again."

"Follow closely," Cadance warned. "It's a maze of twisty passages, all alike." She started walking, slowly enough for Twilight to keep pace with her. "Did you ever hear the story of the Phantom Maid?"

"Phantom Maid?" Twilight asked, eyes wide.

Cadance's voice dropped into the breathy, spooky tone that ponies always used for campfire stories. The effect was somewhat lost in brightly lit hallways instead of the dark woods, but thankfully her audience had a stellar imagination. "There was once a maid, a lazy pegasus who had gotten her job because of family connections than any personal merit. She kept getting in trouble for shirking her duties and napping in hidden corners of the castle where other maids couldn't find her."

"S-she'd just... abandon her work like that? For sleep?" Twilight was horrified at the very thought.

"That isn't the scary part, Twilight," Cadance said, raising her eyebrow and smiling in amusement.

"Yeah, but..." Twilight blushed. "Keep going."

Cadance cleared her throat. "The maid was on her final warning, and so Princess Celestia herself gave her an ultimatum - she had to clean all of the castle windows in a single night, or else she would be fired. Being fired by the Princess herself would mean she'd never have a decent job again, certainly not one as easy as the job she had, so she got to work."

"So the moral of the story is that you have to work hard or else-"

"She worked all through the day and long into the night," Cadance continued. "There were too many windows for anypony to clean them alone, and Princess Celestia knew it. She had intended for it to be a punishment, and to make her aware of how much harder ponies had to work if the maid wasn't helping. But the maid didn't know that, and pushed her body past its limits. When she finally finished, she crawled to one of her hidden napping places and fell into an eternal sleep."

Twilight gasped.

"They say," Cadance whispered. "That you can still hear her snoring to this very day, but nopony has ever found her."

Twilight screamed as Shining Armor snored loudly right behind her, the filly scrambling forwards in terror. Cadance turned to give Shining Armor a fake glare, but they quickly dissolved into giggles.

"That wasn't funny!" Twilight huffed, stopping in front of the huge double doors Cadance had led them to. "I thought I was gonna get eaten by a lazy ghost!"

"I've never seen you move that quickly," Shining Armor said.

"I was scared," Twilight pouted, waiting while Cadance opened the door. Twilight's fear melted away as she saw what was inside. She'd been to libraries before. Every single one in Canterlot, in fact, and even Manehattan's famously massive public library. Many of them had been larger than this, but none of them were as grand.

Instead of almost anonymous shelves of books, here the books were treated like art. The shelves were set into the walls, framed with scrollwork in pale wood and gold leaf. Between the larger shelves, a few books were displayed in glass cases, and at every corner was a stand with one or two tomes on display, open and revealing pages yellowing with age.

"This is amazing," Twilight whispered. The whole library was filled with the smell of old books, that soft, pleasant, smell that came with decaying paper holding the secrets of the ages.

"They should be waiting for us over here," Cadance said, taking Twilight through an open archway into another wing of the library, just as ornate as the first. Two ponies were seated at a low table within, one of them almost identical to Twilight save a golden manepin holding her bangs back and a pair of glasses. The other was much larger, almost glowing with ethereal light.

"Princess Celestia!" Twilight gasped, bowing.

"Now, now," Celestia said. "No need to stand on ceremony, my little pony."

Twilight stood up, blushing. She was relieved to see that she wasn't the only one, Shining Armor getting to his hooves behind her.

"Princess Celestia has kindly volunteered to watch you two for a bit," Cadance explained. "I've been helping Midnight's mother recover from an... accident."

"It wasn't an accident. It was a monster," Midnight corrected.

"I'm happy to help," Celestia said. "I'm very proud of both Cadance and Sunset Shimmer. If I have to make the sacrifice of cancelling a few meetings with the zoning board and postpone their monthly demands that I let them turn part of Canterlot Memorial Park into a commercial district, well, I'll somehow find a way to cope." She smiled serenely, without any hint of sarcasm.

She took the tray from Cadance, putting it in the center of the table.

"Are you sure you can handle things?" Shining Armor asked.

"I already handle all of Equestria every day. I'm sure these two fillies won't cause me any trouble."

Twilight sat at the table, staring at her hooves in silence. She wasn't sure what to do. She really wished she'd read a few etiquette guides, but Twilight hadn't expected to need them.

"Is something wrong?" Princess Celestia asked. Twilight blushed with embarrassment and looked up quickly.

"N-no, your, um, highness? Worshipfulness?" She wasn't even sure what was the right title to use.

"Just 'Princess'," Celestia said, smiling.

"I just don't, um. I don't really know what to say." Twilight looked away again. She knew she looked like an idiot. She felt like an idiot.

"Why don't we start with something simple?" Celestia said. "You can tell me what kind of sandwich you like."

"What kind did Cadance get?" Twilight asked, looking at the tray.

"It looks like watercress and daisy, cucumber and goat cheese, peanut butter and jelly, and, ah," Celestia hesitated. "Ham, presumably for you, Midnight."

"Ham?" Twilight asked, as Midnight grabbed one of the triangles and started eating it with relish. Not literal relish. It did seem to have mayonnaise, though.

"Try it," Midnight offered, levitating one in front of Twilight. "It's so good!"

"Um..." Twilight looked at Celestia. The alicorn sighed.

"It's something of an acquired taste," Celestia said. "It might be a better idea if you stick with something you're used to."

"If she likes it, I'll try it," Twilight said, firmly. "It can't be that bad."

She took the sandwich and sniffed at it. It smelled a little like cloves and cinnamon, and it looked like nothing she'd ever seen before - it was a pink she'd only associated with flower petals.

Twilight carefully bit into it, chewing it slowly. It was strange. There was a kind of odd, sweet savoriness that she'd never tasted, and the texture was rubbery and spongy. Maybe it was some kind of mushroom?

"Huh," Twilight said, thoughtfully, as she swallowed and took another bite. "What plant is this? Some kind of tuber?" If it had been boiled, it might explain some of the odd stringiness. Maybe boiled and then pan-fried?

"It's meat," Midnight explained. With both halves of the ham sandwich gone, she opted to grab a cucumber wedge.

Twilight stopped chewing, looking at the sandwich, her eyes going wide.

"You don't have to eat it, Twilight," Princess Celestia said, softly. "I don't have much of a taste for meat myself."

"N-no, it's okay," Twilight said. "I've eaten meat before. My mom has a pegasus friend that comes over and sometimes they cook fish."

"I've never had fish," Midnight said. "What's it like?"

"It's kind of weird," Twilight admitted. "It doesn't hold together really well, and just falls apart into these little flakes. I don't like it very much."

"The goat cheese is pretty good too," Midnight said. "If you don't wanna finish that half, I'll take it so it doesn't go to waste."

"Thanks," Twilight said, passing it over. She wasn't sure she could have finished it. Fish was one thing, but for all she knew, ham came from something she'd have as a pet, or a friend. Twilight made a mental note to investigate that later to make sure Midnight wasn't eating sentient creatures.

"While you're eating, why don't you tell me about your project?" Celestia suggested.

"We're doing a report on a famous spellcaster," Twilight said. "We eventually agreed on Princess Platinum."

"A very respectable choice," Celestia agreed. "She was an interesting mare."

"You knew her?" Twilight asked, blinking.

"Quite well, though we didn't become friends until well after the Hearth's Warming story you're familiar with." Celestia smiled distantly, her eyes unfocused. "It was a very different time. If it had been a more modern age, we would have-" She coughed. "Well, that's not terribly important."

"No, this is great!" Twilight smiled, opening her saddlebags and taking books out. "You can help verify some of the accuracy of these secondary sources!"

"You brought books to a library?" Midnight asked. "Twilight, that's kinda backwards."

"These books have been carefully curated by myself and my personal assistant," Twilight said, as she stacked the books into exact piles. "They have useful facts and a preliminary reading shows that they generally agree on key points. We can make a checklist of places where they differ..."

Midnight's gaze was unfocused as Twilight spent a further ten minutes explaining her plan to study. She lost track of what she was even proposing after the second Venn diagram.

"Better plan!" Midnight declared. "Instead of all that, we cast the spell! It doesn't matter how much research we do if we can't figure out how to cast the spell that goes along with it."

"But what about all these books?!" Twilight protested, gesturing at her pile.

"We can put them somewhere safe, and maybe..." Midnight considered. "Before we finish today we can go over the books here and you can help pick out more books? There have to be some that aren't in your list."

"I guess," Twilight sighed. "But when we meet at my house you have to read as much as I do."

"Deal!" Midnight held out her hoof. Twilight shook it firmly, still frowning. "So first we gotta get a doll so we can try making it walk around."

"I have Ms. Smartypants," Twilight suggested. She pulled a doll out of her saddlebags.

"That looks almost like..." Midnight stopped herself, and instead nodded. "We'll have to be really careful if we're using her, though." She didn't want to think about hurting the well-loved toy. The stuffed pony Twilight Velvet had gotten her for her first birthday was nearly the same, differing only in the color of the fabric.

"Yeah," Twilight agreed. "That's why I only test safe spells with Ms. Smartypants. She's a good lab assistant, and I can't afford to lose her."

"The come to life spell is relatively simple and safe," Princess Celestia said, taking a book from the shelf behind her without looking. "It's a very responsible choice."

She opened the book and put it down on the table between the two fillies.

"I think this is what you're looking for," she said.

Twilight moved over to look at the spell diagram. It was indeed relatively simple compared to some of the ones she'd seen.

"Oh wow..." Twilight flipped the page, and there was a subtly different diagram. "These are all variations on the same spell!"

"The first diagram is the core of the magic," Celestia explained. "The come to life spell can be altered to give the animated object different orders, like walking in a straight line, moving in a circle, and eventually more complex behaviors like cleaning or avoiding obstacles."

She turned a number of pages, revealing a much more complicated spell.

"All you should need is the one I showed you. It will make the doll stand up and follow simple orders."

"Thank you, Princess Celestia," Twilight said, bowing slightly.

"I'm always happy to help, Twilight," Celestia smiled.

Midnight looked over her shoulder, glancing at the diagram. "This looks easy." Her horn started to glow.

"What happened to being careful?!" Twilight demanded, grabbing Smarty Pants and shielding her with her hooves.

"I'm just feeling it out," Midnight said. "It's easier to learn a spell by casting it a couple times. I'm not gonna use it on your doll until we try it."

"But the spell requires a target!" Twilight yelled, pointing at a section of the diagram. "If you don't choose one, it'll-"

Midnight's horn started to glow with a hard light as the spell drained more magic out of her, like a static charge building as the magic tried to find a place to ground itself. Twilight's head started to pound, and she winced with the sudden, dull pain.

"Hold on, I'll-" Celestia started, before the spell snapped with the force of a thunderbolt. She blinked, looking around. "Well, it did something. All that energy doesn't just go away. Is your doll...?"

"No, she's not moving," Twilight frowned. "What did you do, Midnight?"

"W-well, I promised I wouldn't hurt Smarty Pants, so I pushed the magic that way." She pointed out the window. Celestia stood up and looked down. At the castle statue garden. Some of the statues were already climbing down from their plinths and wandering away.

"Oh no," Celestia breathed. There was one statue in particular that she was worried about, and she couldn't see it from here. "I need to go take care of this."

She vanished in a flash of light as she teleported away, leaving the two fillies alone.

"I'm in so much trouble," Midnight whispered.

"You shouldn't cast spells before you study them carefully and learn every part," Twilight admonished. "That's the first rule they taught us in magic kindergarten!"

"Mom always says that the rules of magic are more like guidelines," Midnight huffed. There was a heavy clatter behind them. Twilight and Midnight turned to see a half-scale statue of a pony in armor walking towards the door.

"There's one in here, too?" Midnight frowned.

"We should wait for Celestia to come back and deal with it," Twilight said.

"A real spellcaster fixes the problems they cause," Midnight declared. "We just have to put it back where it was."

"How are we supposed to do that?" Twilight asked.

"Don't worry, I have a plan," Midnight said, lowering her head and creeping closer to the walking statue. Twilight followed, wondering just what this plan was. "Just do exactly what I say," Midnight whispered.

Twilight nodded. They crept just a little closer.

"Get her!" Midnight yelled, pouncing at the statue. Her hooves closed on the air as the animated statue ran from her grip, bolting out the open door.

"What kind of plan was that?!" Twilight demanded. "'Get her!'"

"I was going on gut instinct and kinda panicked a little," Midnight admitted, brushing dust off of her coat as she picked herself off the ground. "We gotta try to catch it before it goes too far!"

"But Princess Celestia-"

"Don't worry, I live in the castle. It's not like we're gonna get-"

"Lost," Twilight repeated.

"A little," Midnight admitted. "But all we have to do is find a servant or a guard and ask them where to go."

"Every time you say something is simple it gets harder and harder," Twilight frowned. "Where are we?"

"If I knew where we were, we wouldn't be lost." Midnight rolled her eyes. "The castle's not that big, though. This is just a part I haven't been in before."

"If you're lost, you should stay in one place," Twilight said.

"That's only if you wanna be found. We don't wanna be found, we wanna get out of here ourselves before anyone knows we left." Midnight looked down the hallway. "Let's try retracing our steps again."

"When we did that before we walked past that creepy room with no lights anywhere three times before you admitted we were going in circles," Twilight said. "And I'm still pretty sure we went up stairs when we were supposed to go down."

"Then we'll just go down stairs next time we find them," Midnight shrugged, trotting down the hallway. Twilight groaned and followed her, more afraid of being lost and alone than being lost together with a pony she didn't really like.

They walked in silence, looking for anypony who could point them the right way.

"Do you think they're all helping catch the other statues?" Midnight asked, biting her lip. "There's usually tons of ponies around the castle."

"That would make sense. We're not where we're supposed to be because of the statues, so they're probably as out of place as everything else."

"Yeah," Midnight agreed. She looked around and spotted a door that she hadn't seen before. "We haven't tried going that way yet," she pointed towards the double doors.

"We can't get more lost than we are," Twilight sighed. The two fillies walked up to the doors and, working together, opened them, slipping inside.

"It's just somepony's bedroom," Midnight sighed.

"There could be somepony who can help," Twilight said, walking inside. "Hello? Is anypony here?"

The two walked through the suite, past a very large writing desk, and found a bed big enough to house a half-dozen ponies. Or, perhaps, one very large pony.

"I think this is Princess Celestia's bedroom," Midnight said, mystified. She looked around at the oversized furniture, hopping up onto the bed and almost instantly sinking through. "Help!"

Twilight nabbed her tail with telekinesis, pulling her free. "What happened?"

"Cloud bed," Midnight explained, glaring at the offending bedding. "You sink right through if you're not a pegasus. There are special sheets you can use, but I guess Princess Celestia doesn’t need them."

"There's a balcony over there," Twilight pointed. "If we get a view from the outside, maybe we can figure out which way to go."

"Good idea!" Midnight's horn flashed, and she dropped out of Twilight's grip. "I know the castle, so you stay here while I look."

She trotted out to the balcony and started looking around. Twilight, left alone, gravitated towards the familiar. In this case, a bookcase. Princess Celestia had a small bookcase next to her bed, and Twilight found herself more than a little curious as to what kind of books the Princess considered worthy of being so closely at hoof.

"I wonder if she reads my mom's books..." Twilight whispered, looking. Many of the books didn't have titles visible on the spine. Some were so worn that the letters there were little more than a few vague markings on the binding, others obviously left blank on purpose.

Twilight pulled one of the books out and glanced through it. She could feel the enchantment on the pages, the same spell that was on many old books that kept them being old books instead of rotting paper. Unlike almost any book she'd ever read, though, this one wasn't printed. It was hoof-written.

"Oh wow..." Twilight whispered, trying to read the text. It was extremely old, and after a moment to decipher what she was looking at, Twilight realized she was looking at a diary.

"This is a diary..." Twilight muttered. Her eyes went wide. "Princess Celestia's diary! I'll be thrown in a dungeon for reading this!"

"What's that?" Midnight asked, as she trotted into the room, grabbing the book. Twilight let her have it, letting go for fear of causing damage. "Oh neat! This has stuff about Princess Platinum!"

"It does?" Twilight asked, blinking.

"Yeah!" Midnight turned the page. "It's in that weird old Equestrian that uses 'f' instead of 's' but I think I can translate. 'We retired from the ball along with Platinum, the wine having stirred our blood..." She looked up. "What does that mean?"

"I donno. Keep reading. Maybe the context explains it."

"'We returned to Our chambers with her, and We will remember the rest of that night for ten thousand years hence, though We fear Luna had much to explain to the guests regards the cries of passion that so shook Our castle.'"

"Read a little more. Maybe we can use something in our report!"

"Twilight?" Celestia called. "Midnight?" She'd tracked their magic to her room with the help of the castle wards, though she couldn't imagine why they'd have gone there instead of simply waiting for her to return. Maybe they were afraid they'd be punished for the mishap.

Celestia opened the door, prepared to give her usual speech about how she wasn't angry and that this was a wonderful learning opportunity.

"No, I'm telling you, that doesn't make any sense," Twilight argued. "There aren't any flowers named after Princess Platinum, much less ones 'overflowing with sweet nectar'. It has to be some kinda metaphor."

"But it could have gone extinct-" Midnight argued, pointing to a passage in a book that Celestia was intimately familiar with. The book was immediately surrounded with a golden glow and snapped shut, nearly catching Midnight's hoof.

"Princess!" Twilight gasped, ears folding flat against her head. "We got lost and we didn't know what to do."

"It's fine, Twilight Sparkle, no harm done," Celestia said, her eye twitching only a little as she put the book away, making a mental note to put her journals somewhere more secure, like the sun.

"Princess, what did it mean when it said about Princess Platinum's preening skills? She didn't have wings and-"

Celestia cast a silence spell, Twilight's question ending abruptly even as her lips kept moving.

"Now how about-" Celestia started, before realizing she was silenced as well. She dismissed the field of silence before continuing. "How about we go talk about what you learned, and never talk about my journal ever again? It's private, and it's very rude to read another pony's diary."

"I took some notes, and-" Twilight held up a scroll.

Celestia snatched it and the paper instantly burned to ash.

"Very rude," Celestia repeated, still smiling. "Now let's go get something full of sugar. I feel rather drained after all that excitement." And she'd love to return the fillies to their parents with enough sweets in them to keep them bouncing off the walls.

"Yes, Princess," Midnight sighed, following Celestia as she turned to leave.

"Do you still have your copy of the notes?" Twilight whispered.

"Yeah," Midnight nodded. "I'll ask Cadance later. She knows about alicorn stuff."

The two nodded. There was no way that plan could go wrong.

Chapter 8

"Mom, I told you, I can totally handle this," Shining Armor said, smiling. "It's not like two fillies can get into a lot of-"

"No," Twilight Velvet said, putting a hoof on his lips to shush him. "Don't you dare say that, Shiny. You're a wonderful son, but please don't tempt fate. Do you remember when Twilight was a baby and she had a magical surge that turned your father into a mare for a week?"

"It was really awkward explaining to my friends why I suddenly had two moms."

"It was even more awkward for me, believe me," Twilight Velvet sighed. "Now, the good thing is that they're going to be kept busy with their little research project. Books should keep them out of any real trouble for a few hours... maybe I should cancel and stay here."

"Mom, you've been talking about this meeting for a week," Shining Armor said. "You're worrying about nothing."

"It's not nothing," Velvet sighed. "Just promise me you'll be smart about this? I wish I had time to find another foalsitter, but she backed out at the last minute because of some little stories she heard from the neighbors and-"

"Calm down, mom," Shining Armor laughed. "I promise, you'll come home and everything will be perfectly fine."

"Do you have the list I gave you?" Velvet asked.

"I have it right here," Shining Armor said. "Let's see - make sure they eat, make sure Twily gets a bath..."

"And it has the list of rules that they have to follow," Velvet continued.

"Right. No using magic without adult supervision. I count as adult supervision, right?"

"Only if they're practicing spells that aren't going to burn the house down." Velvet looked around warily. "It's probably better if they don't use magic at all."

"Let's see... no going into your and dad's room. That's fair. No going into the writing room. No playing in the kitchen..." Shining skipped down the long list. "No knives, scissors, or particularly sharp pieces of paper?"

"Twilight has problems with telekinesis sometimes, you know that. Your father never could get the record player out of the wall after she accidentally threw it. We had to just plaster over it, and it still turns itself on every Saturday."

"No reading ancient tomes. And it continues on to say 'especially if they're written in horse latin in suspiciously red ink.'"

"She does get curious about old books," Velvet muttered.

"That's a good joke, though, mom. I mean, as if we have books like that lying around..." He trailed off, looking at her expression.

"Just keep them out of trouble," Velvet sighed. "If nothing is on fire and the house still has all its walls, I'll double your allowance."

"It'll be fine. They're just studying in Twilight's room, right?" Shining Armor smiled. "I'll go let them know what's going on, and you and dad have a good time."

"Keep both eyes open," Velvet warned.

"I will!" Shining protested, going upstairs. He was sure his mother was overreacting. She had an important meeting with her editor, after all, and the stress was just leaking out into other things. If Cadance could manage to keep Twilight and Midnight under control, how hard could it be? She was basically a pushover anyway.

Shining knocked on Twilight's door.

"It's open!" Twilight said. Shining opened the door. Twilight sat on one side of the room, surrounded by open books. A second filly - and it took Shining Armor a moment to remind himself that it wasn't really a second Twilight Sparkle - sat on the other side, adjusting her glasses as she looked at her own pile of books.

"How are you two doing?" Shining Armor asked. "The foalsitter didn't show up, so I'm going to stick around and take care of you tonight."

"Don't you have Guard training tomorrow?" Twilight frowned.

"Are you worried I won't be able to handle you without combat training?" Shining Armor teased. "I didn't know your foalsitters had to defeat you in a magic duel before you'd let them tuck you into bed."

"I just don't want you getting in trouble!" Twilight blushed, her cheeks pink. "I know how important the Royal Guard is to you."

"And I know how important school is to you," Shining Armor said. "So I know you'll be busy writing that report all night."

"It's a very important research assignment," Twilight said, firmly. "I have to present my findings to the whole class, and we weren't even given firm guidelines on how long the report is supposed to be!"

"Ms. Wormwood said it should be about a page long," Midnight muttered.

"But she didn't say if it should be standard ruled, or college ruled! Or what size paper to use!"

"College ruled, obviously," Midnight said. "I mean, who uses standard ruled paper?"

"Well yes," Twilight agreed. "But my point is that it's open to interpretation. What if other students take advantage of that and turn a report in on wide-ruled paper? They'd be doing almost twenty percent less work and still be following the guidelines!"

"You could always use wide-ruled paper," Shining pointed out. "Then you'd be taking advantage of what the teacher said."

"That's dishonest," Twilight frowned. "And dishonesty has no place in the academic world. The important thing is learning and improving yourself. The paper is how we're going to demonstrate that to the teacher."

"The important thing is the spell," Midnight said. "And we've basically got that working. We should test it a couple more times just to make sure."

"Mom doesn't want any magic practice tonight," Shining Armor said. "Besides, you've got a lot of books to read, right?"

"But casting spells is more fun," Midnight grumbled.

"We have to get the paper written," Twilight said. "It doesn't matter if we get the spell working if we only have half of the assignment done. If we fail this, we might have to repeat magic kindergarten!"

"I don't think you'd have to-" Shining started, not that Twilight was listening. She kept talking right over him.

"And then it would be on my permanent record! Twilight Sparkle, the filly who had to repeat magic kindergarten! Everypony would know my name and they'd think I was an idiot! I'd never be able to go to a good school, or become a professor, or a doctor, or a doctor professor, and I'd never get tenure!"

"You're overthinking this a little-"

"I'd end up on the streets, doing illegal math homework for other ponies just so I could make enough bits to eat!" Twilight gasped. "I'd have to... to... get a job that wasn't academic! I don't wanna be a math dealer, Shiny!"

"Okay, I think that's getting a little out of hoof," Shining sighed. "Twily, you're the smartest filly I know. You're not going to end up on the street. Also I don't think there's actually a black market for algebra."

"You don't know that for sure," Twilight said, sniffling.

"Now, how about we think about something more fun?" Shining Armor suggested. "Mom left me a few bits to get you girls some dinner, and I was gonna order a pizza."

"I've never had pizza before," Midnight frowned. "What's it like?"

"You've never had pizza?" Twilight gasped.

"The cooks at the castle always make a lot of weird food," she said. "Most of the time it's like... these big baked things that look really pretty on the table but don't really taste good."

"Really?"

"Yeah. Like... last night we had this huge squash." Midnight sat back and used her forehooves to mime a shape like a melon. "It was mostly hollowed out and then stuffed with like acorns and breadcrumbs and a lot of weird vegetables. It was really bland, even with the sauce they put on it."

"Don't worry, pizza is really great," Twilight said. "We can get it with mushrooms and spinach!"

"Mushrooms?" Midnight stuck out her tongue. "Ew."

"What's wrong with mushrooms?" Twilight frowned.

"They're gross and slimy. What about onions?"

"You've never even had pizza before!" Twilight huffed. "How would you know if onions are good on pizza or not?"

"Onions are basically good on everything," Midnight countered.

"But you don't know for sure!" Twilight said. "You should try it the way I like it first, since my toppings have been determined by experience."

"I'm never going to like it if we have to get mushrooms," Midnight retorted.

"Girls, please," Shining Armor said. "You can compromise."

"How can she not like mushrooms?!" Twilight said, turning angrily to Shining Armor. "That's impossible to compromise with! They're objectively the best topping! Next she'll want pineapple like a degenerate!"

"What if we just get a plain pizza?" Shining Armor asked. "Everyone likes cheese pizza, right?"

"It would be better with toppings," Twilight muttered.

"Half cheese, and half mushroom and spinach," Shining Armor corrected. "That way, Midnight can try your pizza, and she'll still have something to eat if she doesn't like it."

"But what about you?" Twilight frowned.

"I'll eat whatever you two don't," Shining Armor smiled. "I don't mind."

Shining Armor looked at the empty pizza box, as if there might be another slice hidden somewhere inside.

"How did those two eat an entire pizza?" He whispered. "There shouldn't even be room inside them for that much food."

"Shiny, help!" Twilight yelled, from her room. Shining Armor dropped the paper plate he'd been holding and ran upstairs, ready for some kind of disaster. Maybe Midnight had finally revealed her true form as some kind of awful reptilian shapeshifter-

"What's wrong, Twily? Is it another magic surge?!" Shining Armor bolted into her room, a spell to suppress fires already half-cast.

"Midnight wants to arrange the information in the report by order of importance!" Twilight said, still panicking.

"...And?" Shining Armor was starting to feel like this wasn't as much of an emergency as he had assumed.

"And that's totally inappropriate for this!" Twilight said, drawing out each word like she was an adult talking to a foal instead of the reverse.

"Doing it chronologically means we have to talk about a bunch of boring stuff before we get to anything good," Midnight said. "No one cares about how many laws she passed in old Unicornia!"

"It's important to understand the context involved before the founding of Equestria," Twilight countered. "Listing facts in order of some arbitrary importance or interest means we'd just be jumping around and things would get out of order."

"But it also means we can focus on the things ponies care about," Midnight said.

"It's an oral report. We should go in chronological order so it's like a story," Twilight said. "You wouldn't start a story with describing the climax, you have to build up to the big parts."

"...And why am I here?" Shining asked.

"You have to tell her we have to do it my way," Twilight frowned. "It's my house, so she has to do what I want to do."

"You could learn a lesson about compromise," Shining Armor suggested. "Like with the pizza. I thought we were on the right track there. Both sides make small sacrifices and-"

"And this is about my grade!" Twilight yelled.

"You could try writing the report both ways?" Shining Armor suggested.

"We can only present it once," Twilight said. "It has to be perfect."

"That's why I wanna do the important stuff first. If ponies are falling asleep at their desks because we spend ten minutes talking about how Princess Platinum came from a family of miners, they'll never listen when we get to the cool parts where she fights monsters using an army of golems!"

"There's no evidence that actually happened," Twilight said. "According to Scholarly Prose, it's more likely that she actually led a small band of fully-armored knights. Full plate armor that covered the entire body was a new invention at the time and almost no peasants were familiar with it, so they thought it had to be magically animated statues instead of just ponies. The rest was just bad translation and speculation from ponies who just wanted to find out about 'cool' things instead of real, verified facts."

"But we do have evidence," Midnight retorted. "The spell we learned. It can be used to animate golems."

"That doesn't mean it was used in that way," Twilight said. "The come-to-life spell has a lot of applications, but combat isn't one of them. Otherwise the guard would be using golems now."

Both fillies looked at Shining Armor.

"W-why are you looking at me?" He asked, backing away.

"Does the Royal Guard have a secret golem army?" Midnight asked.

"You can tell us. We just need to know for this report," Twilight added. "Not that it's evidence that Princess Platinum had a golem army, but if one does exist now it would be proof that it's possible and we could mention it as a possibility."

"And we wouldn't publish your name," Midnight added.

Shining Armor looked at the two fillies and sighed. It was going to be a long night.

"Shiny, I'm bored," Twilight complained. "Midnight and I are done and we wanna do something fun."

"You finished your paper already?" Shining Armor asked, surprised. He'd been reading the Equestrian Infantrypony's Uplifting Primer over again, and hadn't really been paying attention to the fillies. "If you're done with your paper, maybe we should..." Shining Armor looked around. He needed a distraction. Something that would keep them occupied for the next few hours. "Play a game!" His gaze settled on the stack of board games on the bookshelf.

"Oh! You could run Oubliettes and Ogres!" Twilight said.

"I was thinking more like Mareopoly," Shining Armor said. "O&O is a little complicated for a filly your age."

"What's Oubliettes and Ogres?" Midnight asked.

"It's a game where you slay monsters and get treasure and stuff while you pretend you're a hero," Twilight said.

"Oh, so basically what my mom does." Midnight said. "That's cool. Let's do that."

"It's a really complicated game," Shining Armor warned. "You have to build a character, and the form is almost two full pages. Plus you need a certified O&O GM to sign off on them and run games..."

"You run for your friends, though, right?" Twilight asked. "So you can run a game for us."

"I am certified, but-"

"Can we see the books?" Midnight asked.

Shining Armor considered for a moment. They'd probably end up spending all night just reading things. But that was exactly what he wanted, wasn't it?

"I made a unicorn wizard with the magical academy background and a double specialty in divination, with necromancy and evocation as forbidden schools," Twilight said, pushing her character sheet in front of Shining Armor, a mere fifteen minutes later. "I used my feat for additional spells in my spellbook at each level, and the magical academy background means I don't have to declare what spells I have memorized."

"Okay," Shining Armor said, looking things over. Everything seemed to add up correctly, though she'd used more than one optional rule that he hadn't seen before until they were pointed out to him. "Wait, you have a pseudodragon familiar?"

"I took the Dragon Pact alternate class feature," Twilight said. "It reduces my starting health but lets me have a pseudodragon at level 1."

"I guess that's fine..." Shining Armor muttered. "But you're going to be really vulnerable to damage."

"A wizard's starting health is so low it doesn't matter," Twilight said. "I just have to be smart."

"I'm not going to pull any punches," Shining Armor warned.

"I'll be fine," Twilight said.

"If you say so. What about you, Midnight?"

"I made a unicorn sorcerer," Midnight said, holding up her sheet. "With the magical prodigy background I start out being able to cast a second-level spell!" She grinned. "Plus, I spent my starting feat on Spell Focus so my evocation spells will be harder to resist."

"Evocation spells? So you're going to be a fire mage?" Shining Armor asked. "Wait, why do you have a sword?"

"My unicorn is half-zebra, so she can use it as an implement to cast her spells." Midnight pointed at her sheet. "Plus I get free weapon training in it. I traded the nature lore bonuses away for an ancestral weapon that counts as a magical item."

"But the nature lore bonuses are the whole reason to make your character half-zebra," Shining Armor said, blinking.

"I still get the bonus to spot hidden doors and potion making, just not any of the knowledge skills," Midnight said.

"Okay, I guess. But are you sure both of you want to play casters?" Shining Armor looked between their sheets. "Most of the time you want a balanced party. The classic arrangement is a fighter to protect everypony, a rogue to disable traps and scout, a healer to keep people from being hurt, and a wizard to cast spells."

"The other classes are boring," Twilight said. Midnight nodded in agreement.

"Casting spells is way cooler than just healing ponies or sneaking around," Midnight added. "Besides, you said we could play whatever classes we wanted."

"Okay, okay," Shining Armor sighed and stamped both character sheets with his official O&O stamp, signing off on them. "Just don't blame me if you lose them in your first encounter."

"Let's get going," Midnight said. "I wanna start hunting monsters!"

"Well, let's see..." Shining Armor pulled out his notes. He hadn't had time to design his own adventure, but O&O had plenty of pre-written modules, including a few for brand new characters and players. He'd grabbed one of the simplest, the classic Keep on the Badlands. It was a certified module, so they couldn't blame him if they ended up getting eaten by giant frogs.

"You two already know each other, and you've been traveling along a dirt road towards town," Shining Armor said. "It's a bright, sunny day out, and you're passing through the woods. Describe your characters."

"Squire Page is the picture of a classic unicorn researcher," Twilight said. "She's tall, with a bright blue coat and curly parchment-colored hair. Her cutie mark is a helmet made out of book pages with a plume that's a quill still dripping with ink."

"Nice description," Shining Armor nodded.

"She wears thick robes and heavy saddlebags full of books. Her pseudodragon, Charles, rides on her back and keeps watch around her," Twilight finished.

"Charles?" Midnight asked, raising an eyebrow. "That's a really strange name. Did you make that up?"

"It's from one of mom's fantasy books," Twilight admitted.

"There's nothing wrong with borrowing names," Shining Armor winked. "How about you, Midnight?"

"Well, my character is Flash Fire. She's totally awesome," Midnight said. "She's red with black stripes from her zebra heritage, and wears her mane up in a topknot. She wears armor made from alchemically-treated leaves and has her sword with her at all times. It's an ancient, curved blade from Hippon. Unlike Squire Page, she doesn't carry any books at all, and her cutie mark is an explosion!"

"Okay, well, she definitely sounds dangerous," Shining Armor ventured.

"She is," Midnight nodded. "Do we see any monsters?"

"Well, while you're walking along the road, a pony steps out of the brush and raises a hoof, motioning for you to stop..."

"The road ahead is blocked by a landslide," he said. He pointed to the side. "There's a path through the woods, and I'd be happy to take you, if you'll pay me a few copper coins for the trouble-"

"I waste him with a Fire Burst!" Flash Fire yelled.

"What?!" Shining Armor blinked. Midnight rolled a few dice.

"Ten damage. He can roll a reflex save for half." She smiled up at Shining Armor.

"But he was just a harmless old stallion..." Shining Armor said.

"Does he make the save?" Midnight asked. Shining Armor sighed and rolled.

"No. He falls over, on fire." Shining Armor groaned. "Girls, he was just a normal pony. Not everything is an enemy."

"I have Charles search the body," Twilight said. "As a pseudodragon, he automatically finds anything worth more than one silver piece, and any loose currency."

"He has a few coppers from others that he's guided through the woods, safely, because he was a good and honest pony who was trying to make a few extra bits to get through the tough times-"

"We'll split it evenly," Twilight said.

"Okay, but the road ahead really is blocked off by a landslide," Shining Armor said. "And the guide is currently on fire."

"I cast Find The Way," Twilight said. "It'll lead us more accurately than a guide."

The town was quiet, this early in the morning. The townsfolk were going about their business, not knowing that the two ponies who had just walked into town were murderers.

"We should go to the tavern to find work," Squire Page said.

"Maybe there are some monsters around that they'll pay us to take care of," Flash Fire agreed.

Of course, what neither of them knew was that they were the real monsters, since they'd killed an innocent pony in cold blood.

"Well-met travelers," the stallion behind the bar said. "We haven't gotten a lot of visitors since the road gave out."

"Are there any monsters?" Flash Fire demanded.

"This is a quiet town," the bartender said. "The worst we have is a few diamond dogs that skulk about at the edge of town, but they're not really any trouble."

"We're looking for paying work," Squire Page said. "We're both highly skilled and educated spellcasters."

"If you're adventurers, you could try finding something in Goldmane's Burrow. Legend says that there's treasure in there, but also danger. No one in town goes near it."

"We'll do that, then," Flash Fire declared. "Which way is it?"

"Well, we have a town guide. Didn't he lead you here?"

"Never mind, I'll just cast Find the Way again."

The two left, without a guide or gathering any additional information about the burrow. If the guide had been alive he could have no doubt told them all sorts of tales that would have given them helpful tips about how to deal with the traps and treasure inside the dungeon.

"Shiny, stop it," Twilight huffed. "Killing the old stallion was the obvious thing to do."

"He could have been a bandit," Midnight nodded. "Plus we got money!"

"Fine, fine. You get to Goldmane's Burrow, your spell leading you to a doorway set into a large, low hill..."

"Do you think the doorway is trapped?" Squire Page asked. "I could cast a spell to find out, but I wanna save my spell slots for later."

"It's okay, I know what to do," Flash Fire said. She pulled out her crowbar and started prying at the locked door with her telekinesis, keeping a safe distance to the side. The well-made wooden doorway refuses to give out, and the cheap metal of the crowbar bends.

"It's a masterwork tool," Flash Fire corrected.

The crowbar didn't bend at all, actually. Instead, the door cracked, and opened with a lot of noise, no doubt alerting anything inside, as the lock was forced out of the frame.

"Good work!" Squire Page said. She cast a light spell on a pebble and threw it inside, revealing a patterned tile floor just inside the door.

"Do you think it's trapped?" Flash Fire asked.

"No guards at the door, so it would make sense to have traps inside," Squire Page agreed. "But we can't search for them without using spells."

"We don't really need to search for them," Flash Fire said. "I've got a better idea." She created a summoning gate and brought forth a celestial hound, immediately ordering it to walk into the doorway ahead of them. The noble, brave beast didn't even see the pit trap coming before it fell.

"It was trapped," Midnight said. "But it's statistically unlikely that there will be another trap in the same room. Is the hound dead?"

"It's injured but still alive," Shining Armor said.

"I use my telekinesis to get it out of the pit and order it to continue into the room."

The brave, noble hound walked through the doorway at the other end of the room and was struck down in an instant by a crude blade, disappearing into motes of light as it collapsed.

"An ambush!" Flash Fire gasped. "I knew it."

"We did make a lot of noise opening the door," Squire Page said. She threw another pebble further into the ruins, revealing the shape lying in wait was a diamond dog.

"What do you mean, what type of gem is it?" Shining Armor asked. "You can't tell."

"My pseudodragon can with his treasure sense," Twilight said.

"A diamond dog's position in the pack is determined by what kind of gem he wears," Midnight added. "So we can get an idea of how strong he is if we can determine that."

"Well, it's a quartz," Shining Armor sighed.

"Then he's super low-level," Midnight said.

"Flare Arrow!" Flash Fire yelled, her magical attack striking true and felling the Diamond Dog.

"There are probably more of them," Squire Page said. "But now that we know what we're looking for, I can use a Lifesense spell to see them through the walls."

"Unless the walls are made of lead, of course," Twilight added. "But that's highly unlikely."

"It only has a range of fifteen paces," Shining Armor said. "So you aren't going to be able to see very far with it."

"Actually, by using the blood of the diamond dog we slayed as a focus, I can use a variant of the spell that allows me to see a hundred paces out but restricts it to one species," Twilight corrected.

Squire Page could tell even from the entrance room that there were three other Diamond dogs in the burrow, all of them in a central chamber below. Using a ladder as a bridge to bypass the pit, the adventurers stopped in front of the stairway leading to the lower chamber.

Squire Page pulled a bag of marbles from her overburdened saddlebags and cast an illusion over them to make them look like glittering gems before pouring them down the stairs, the marbles making an awful racket on the way down, no doubt further alerting anything lying in wait.

"They'll have to make a will save to see through the illusion," Twilight reminded Shining Armor. "At a minus five penalty from my specialty."

"Minus five? Are you sure?" He opened the rulebook.

"Page one hundred and sixty six," Twilight said. "I took the double specialty option for divination. The effect applies to all will saves."

"Fine, with a penalty." Shining Armor groaned. Diamond dogs already had abysmally low will saves, and a penalty that low basically meant they'd have no chance of success.

Two of the diamond dogs ran over to the apparent gems, already arguing with each other about them.

"Fire Burst!" Flash Fire yelled, throwing a spell into the room, Squire Page closing the door after the mote of flame lanced past. There was a muffled boom, and the two diamond dogs started yelling, stomping up the stairs, singed but not defeated-

"In a confined space, the damage of the spell is increased," Midnight corrected. "The blast reflects off of the walls and doubles the damage if the area isn't large enough to contain it."

The diamond dogs managed one step before falling over, having taken significantly more damage than they'd thought they had.

"There's still one left," Squire Page said, "And I think he's the boss. My spell shows him as being more powerful than the others."

"I'm almost out of spell slots," Flash Fire said. This, of course, was the biggest weakness of spellcasters, especially at low levels. While their power was significant, they had little staying power. Perhaps if they had a brave fighter to fight the diamond dogs without using more resources, or a rogue that could have gotten them inside without alerting the enemies, they would have had a better chance.

"Charles can handle this," Squire Page said. She ordered him to assume his natural invisibility, sending him downstairs. Since she could see through his eyes, Squire Page could see that the last diamond dog was far larger than the others, with crude armor and a wicked axe. His ears flick up as he hears the invisible creature fly into the room.

"Shining, are you sure you're certified?" Twilight frowned. "It says in the book that pseudodragon flight is magical and silent."

"No it doesn't," Shining Armor protested.

"Pseudodragons have both the dragon and fey subtypes," Twilight said. "And according to the Bestiary Book, creatures with the fey subtype, like breezies and flutterponies, have magical flight."

The silent, invisible creature did not alert the diamond dog at all, actually, though he was still on guard, having just heard two of his packmates get set on fire, and that's entirely fair.

"I should have taken Silent Spell," Flash Fire muttered.

"The applications are very limited for an evoker," Squire Page said. "The diamond dogs would still have made noise when they got hit by the spell, even if the blast itself was silent."

"Yeah," Flash Fire sighed.

Charles got around behind the diamond dog, lying in wait.

"Okay, then. I cast Mage Armor and charge him!" Midnight said.

"I ready an action for later," Twilight added.

"You're a sorceress," Shining Armor said, slowly. "Are you sure? Sorcerers aren't really known for being tough or strong. Going into close combat might be deadly, even if you have an ancestral weapon."

"I'm sure," Midnight said. "I have the element of surprise, and with Charles behind him, I get a flanking bonus to my attack!"

"You lost the element of surprise when you used that Flame Burst."

"It's a metaphor," Midnight said. "Can I roll my attack now?"

"Okay. Remember you get a +2 bonus for charging." He didn't add that she'd still need to roll extremely well to hit the diamond dog pack leader.

"Natural 20!"

"What?"

Flash Fire charged into the room, curved sword held high in her magic, and brought it down on the Diamond Dog, her weapon slipping through a gap in his armor and wounding him badly. However, the monster was strong enough that even that attack wasn't enough to fell him instantly. He raised his axe and brought it down-

"I use my readied action to cast Mirror Image on Flash Fire," Twilight said. "It creates two duplicates of her, and he has to roll randomly to determine which one he hits."

On an illusion of Flash Fire, which vanished into glittering dust. He spun with the backswing and attacked again, his axe going wide and hitting the other illusion, shattering the spell protecting Flash Fire.

"Two attacks?" Midnight frowned. "That means he's at least level six!"

"This module was designed for a full party," Shining Armor said. "There are only two of you, and neither of you is really good at melee combat."

"After he attacks, Charles gets his turn," Twilight said. She rolled some dice. "Fourteen."

"That's not enough to hit."

"Fourteen, plus his bonus to hit from flanking, and being invisible, and studying the opponent for a round," Twilight corrected.

"Okay well..." Shining Armor frowned. "How do you even know all those rules?"

"I read the book, Shiny. Now save against the poison sting."

The Diamond Dog yelled as he was stabbed in the back by a tiny, annoying dragon familiar that shouldn't have been allowed. With some incredibly bad luck, the poison actually managed to affect him, weakening him and making his strikes slower and less accurate.

"Shocking Touch!" Flash Fire yelled, as she channeled electricity through her sword.

"Since he's wearing metal armor, I get a bonus to hit and damage," Midnight said. "I do... fifteen points of damage!" She grinned.

"How, exactly, do you figure that?" Shining Armor asked. "At best it's twelve."

"I'm using my sword as the spell implement for a touch attack, so I get to do its weapon damage, too."

"By my calculations, that should be enough to finish him."

"It would be, if he didn't have the Diehard feat!" Shining Armor said. He didn't like to cheat, even if it was just changing the rules a little, but he was getting annoyed at how casually his little sister was treating the game. "He gets another attack. Natural twenty!"

"Don't forget the weakness effect," Twilight said. "That means you roll twice and take the worst roll."

"Right, whatever," Shining Armor sighed. He knew he'd still hit as long as he didn't roll a natural one.

The Diamond Dog drunkenly swung its axe, the poison throwing it off balance and making it miss with what should have been less than a five percent chance of failure. Thankfully, it avoided hurting itself.

"You have to roll twice for that, too."

For all of five seconds before falling on its own axe.

"We won!" Midnight yelled, happily.

"What did you win?" asked a voice from the doorway. Shining Armor looked up, blinking. Cadance was standing there, looking amused.

"We beat a bunch of monsters!" Midnight said. "And we did it with magic. And a sword."

"And a dragon," Twilight added. "A friendly one."

"That sounds very exciting," Cadance giggled. "I want to hear all about it. Maybe you can tell me on the way back to the castle, Midnight?"

"Is it time to go already?" Midnight sighed.

"It's getting late," Cadance said. "Sunset wants to see you before she has to go to bed too."

"Okay," Midnight said, hopping down. "Thank you for running the game, Shining Armor."

"Maybe we can play again?" Twilight asked. "We could start by dividing the treasure from this game."

"...Yeah," Midnight smiled. "That sounds fun."

"I don't know if I'll have the time to run any games..." Shining Armor said quickly. "I mean, I've got training."

"Pleaaase?" Twilight asked, her eyes wide and sparkling.

"Well... maybe, if we plan the time carefully," Shining Armor said, folding like a laundromat.

"Yay!" Twilight cheered. "I'm gonna read all the game books and find some fun spells to try for next time! Maybe some of them are even real spells that I can learn!"

"What have I gotten myself into?" Shining Armor sighed.

"Don't worry," Cadance whispered. "I won't tell your drill sergeant that two fillies defeated your tactical acumen."

"C-Cadance!" Shining Armor blushed.

"Next time, try describing something mundane in great detail," she suggested. "Twilight will spend hours trying to figure it out."

"Will she?" Shining Armor asked, considering.

"And try attacking them when they rest. It's the time spellcasters are most vulnerable." Cadance whispered.

"Thanks for the tip. Next time, Twilight, next time..." Shining Armor laughed, marking the place in the module.

Chapter 10

Sunset slammed the door open and stomped into her quarters, gritting her teeth so hard that it was a dental miracle that none of her molars shattered. She was, rather unusually for Sunset, wearing a rather overwrought dress in white and gold. It was far removed from her usual style of wearing nothing at all around the castle, or a practical traveling cloak when hunting monsters.

The long train caught on something, and Sunset growled. Her patience had gone extinct approximately at the same time as the dinosaurs, and the frustration boiling in her veins instantly turned her dress from formal wear into uncomfortable restraints.

She tore the dress from herself, the destruction making her feel a little better as she threw it into a corner of the room, buttons flying. She kicked the last remnants away from her fetlocks and shook ribbons from her hair, leaving her wearing only the bandages around her healing wounds.

"Sunset?" Cadance asked, as she looked into the room. Her eyes fell on the dress and she winced. She knew how expensive it had been.

"What!?" Sunset demanded, not looking at her. "Did she send you to try and change my mind?"

"No," Cadance said, stepping in and closing the door to give them some privacy. "I just don't understand what happened. Are you okay? Did Celestia say something wrong?"

"Everything was wrong," Sunset muttered. "Not that you'd understand."

"Sunset, you're my friend, I want to understand," Cadance said, taking a careful step forwards. She could feel the magic pouring from Sunset. It had the same kind of aura as a thunderstorm, a lot of energy just looking for something to ground it. She could actually see sparks manifesting around her, harmless discharges of high-energy magic.

"Did you know what she was going to do today?" Sunset asked, turning on Cadance with her eyes narrowed in suspicion.

"No. I think she wanted it kept a surprise." Cadance almost took a step back when Sunset advanced on her, the firey mare terrifying even when she wasn't the object of her rage. Sunset watched her for a few more moments, then relaxed, her shoulders slumping.

"Well she should have known better before humiliating me."

A garden party. There were at least two or three a week in Canterlot, all of them rather dull affairs that were more or less an excuse for the nobility to socialize with each other. Even political enemies would attend each other's parties, and a lot of backroom deals were hashed out over punch and pie.

The ones held at the castle were of course the most widely attended, because everypony wanted to get closer to the Princess. Sunset usually avoided them like the plague. She hadn't been born to nobility, so she was either pitied or mocked depending on how sympathetic the ponce involved wanted to seem that week. Most of the time, it was a mix of both that shifted from one side to the other when the speaker was in public and back again when they thought they spoke in confidence.

Most of the mockery was behind her back now. Sunset might not have earned any real fame with her exploits, but the nobles knew that if they pushed her too hard, she'd do something about it, and Celestia may well not protect them.

"I'm glad you attended," Princess Celestia said, quietly. Sunset sighed and tried not to squirm in the dress she'd been given to wear.

"I didn't have much of a choice. You almost made a royal decree ordering me to come." Sunset tried to keep her expression neutral as she looked over the crowd. Part of her wondered if Celestia had brought her along just to keep ponies away, like having an attack dog at the ready.

"You need to learn to deal with the nobility," Celestia said, snatching two cups from a passing maid and giving one to Sunset. "It's better to start early and make some friends with the right ponies."

"And who are the right ponies?" Sunset asked, sipping carefully at the punch. She looked down at the cup and frowned. She had absolutely no idea which fruit that was supposed to taste like, but she suspected it had gone off.

"That is an excellent question, and I find myself asking that quite often. Princess Cadance is an excellent start," Celestia replied quietly. "However, I do have a tactic that I use, even if it's cheating."

Sunset's ears perked up at that. "Oh?"

"I'm the only pony that gets to make new nobility," Celestia said. "With the right choices you can stack the deck a bit." She winked.

"But it's impossible to remove nobility, right?" Sunset asked. "So you can't just make all your allies nobility."

"Not impossible, but the process is extraordinarily difficult. It's important to make the right choice, because you end up living with it for a very long time." Celestia nodded subtly across the garden. "For example, Lady Upper Crust. Her grandmother worked tirelessly to stop a famine in Zebrica. The care and charity she showed have, unfortunately, not been mirrored in her granddaughter."

"So you just hope for the best?" Sunset asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Educated guesses. But still guesses." Celestia shrugged slightly. "But I have been thinking it's time to create a new noble house. It might help smooth things out down the line."

"What?" Sunset frowned, not liking the tone that Celestia had taken with that.

"Everypony," Celestia said, clearing her throat to get their attention. "Thank you all for attending. I invited you all here today to make an important announcement." She looked down at Sunset Shimmer. "With her tireless efforts in hunting down threats to Equestria with no recompense, and her selfless sacrifice in protecting Princess Mi Amore Cadenza..."

Sunset's pupils shrank, her ears folding back.

"Sunset Shimmer has shown that she is one of Equestria's shining stars, and so I confer to her the title of Duchess—"

"Don't," Sunset Shimmer said, interrupting Princess Celestia.

"What?" Celestia said, blinking in surprise.

"I said don't even start!" Sunset Shimmer repeated, more firmly. "I can't believe you'd—" She took a deep breath and walked away, trying to rein her temper in.

"Sunset, wait," Celestia hissed, glancing from her to the staring crowd of nobility.

"I don't want to hear it. Enjoy your party." Sunset vanished in a flash of light, shattering the castle's teleportation wards as she went.

Celestia coughed and turned to the crowd. "Ah, well." She gave a small smile. "How about that weather?"

"Are you sure she humiliated you?" Cadance asked, skeptical. "I'm pretty sure it was the other way around. She was just trying to do something nice for you, and you acted like she'd insulted you."

"I don't want her pity or her titles," Sunset said, firmly. "If she'd spoken to me in private before trying to drop that on my lap, then I would have explained it to her then."

"Well, explain it to me," Cadance said. "Because I don't understand either."

Sunset turned to Cadance and glared for a moment before closing her eyes and taking another deep breath to calm herself. "She didn't try to make me a duchess because of anything I did. It's all about you."

"What do you mean?" Cadance asked.

"Do you know how many times I've been hurt protecting ponies?" Sunset asked. She tore the bandages from her side, revealing the shorn coat and healing wound there. "Sure, this was bad, but I've been hurt badly before." She raised her foreleg and showed off a small scar nearly in her armpit. "This doesn't look like much, but I've got a matching scar on my shoulder on the other side. Giant mutant manticore, hit me with an iron spine that went right through me and barely missed my heart."

Cadance paled.

"Then there's this—" Sunset turned her head and pushed her mane up, showing a scar on her head hidden by her hairline. "Mind flayer tried to eat my brain, and fractured my skull before I stopped it."

Cadance rushed forward and grabbed Sunset, pulling her into a hug. "But... Celestia always said you were just training, or you'd hurt yourself in an accident."

"And she never mentioned when I saved dozens or hundreds of lives," Sunset muttered. "Think about that. I save all those ponies, but it's not until I save you that she cares at all. That's why it's not about me at all! If it was about me getting hurt to save lives, that's one thing. But it's not. It's because I saved your life, and your life is just that much more important to her than mine is."

Cadance wasn't sure what to say about that, and just held Sunset for a few moments in silence.

"It makes me sick," Sunset whispered. "I keep thinking I'm getting somewhere and then I'm reminded that I'm just not all that important to her."

"Do you hate me?" Cadance asked, quietly.

"No," Sunset said, very quickly. "I don't. I envy you, sure, but you're... nice. Nothing that happened to me is your fault, not really. I blamed you for a while, but it's stupid. You never tried to do anything but be nice to me. It's Celestia and everypony else that makes things difficult."

"But if it's me, then I should be able to fix this," Cadance said. "But I don't even know where to start."

Sunset pushed Cadance away, stepping over to the dress she'd thrown aside and looking at it. "You can't fix everything. Tartarus, take this as a lesson for the future: don't be as stupid as Celestia. She probably honestly thought making me nobility would actually change anything."

"To be fair, a duchess does outrank almost all of the nobility. It's one step below being a Princess." Cadance scraped at the ground with her hoof. "Even if you don't get along with them, they'd have to respect your rank."

"They'd respect me to my face and talk about me behind my back even more than they do now!" Sunset snapped. "Nothing would change except they'd resent me even more."

"And what would change it?" Cadance asked, bluntly. "Do you think they'd respect you more if she put a crown on your head and made you a Princess? Even if you were an alicorn, would it instantly change their opinion?"

"No," Sunset sighed, putting the dress back down.

"So what would it hurt if Celestia made you a duchess? She just wanted to do something nice for you. Even if you think she's misguided, it's still a reward, isn't it?"

Sunset snorted. "You think I'm like a foal getting upset because their parents got them the 'wrong' gifts for Hearth's Warming."

"I wouldn't quite put it like that," Cadance shrugged.

"But only because you're polite," Sunset said. "I'll... talk to her later. I just need some space for a while to cool down." The aura around her started to fade, the tempest calming to a low rumble.

"Do you want me to try talking to her first?" Cadance asked.

"It's my mess, and I'll clean it up," Sunset sighed. "I'm just glad I stopped her before she actually made me nobility."

"I don't think you did," Cadance considered. "I'm not sure of the actual rules, but she did actually say she was making you a Duchess, said how you'd earned it, and did it all in public in front of your, well, peers." Her mouth twisted as if she'd bitten into something sour. "For lack of a better term."

"Sounds to me like you dislike them almost as much as I do," Sunset said.

"You're worried that they'll judge you, Celestia's personal student, who has lived in the castle for years and has obviously been being groomed to be Celestia's right hoof. How do you think they've dealt with me, when they'd never even met me before?"

"Probably not too nicely," Sunset admitted.

"You know, something we have in common is that we're both orphans," Cadance said, sitting down and starting to idly clean some of the mess Sunset had made in the room. "I don't remember how I lost my parents or when, but I remember being alone."

It was a tiny hamlet, no more than a dozen shacks let in a small inlet on the coast. Every morning, ponies would take boats out and gather fish, and every afternoon they'd return with their catch. Some would be frozen and shipped to Griffonia, some would be salted and stored away, and the rest fed the families of those that lived there.

The entire town was full of earth ponies who had lived and worked alongside the sea for generations. The homes had small gardens, the earth ponies using the least edible of the fish as fertilizer to help yield some growth in the sandy soil of the inlet.

One of those gardens was where Cadance had her first memory. She remembered sneaking in to try and steal some of the underripe tomatoes and berries growing there, and very distinctly remembered being hit with a broom several times until the old mare holding it had realized she was a filly and not a wild animal.

When it had proved impossible to find her parents, she had been taken in by the couple, though in such a small town, she was like family to almost all of them. As the only pegasus, she quickly made herself invaluable, being able to bring rain clouds to provide fresh water, give wind to the sails of the boats in the harbor, and improve everypony's mood with her brilliant spirit.

It was a quiet life, but one that was full of love and growing prosperity. If nothing had ever happened to change it, Cadance wouldn't have regretted a thing about it.

But while some seek greatness, and others achieve it, Cadance was in the unfortunate third group that have greatness thrust upon them.

The trouble started quietly, as some of the worst disasters do. Ponies who had been best friends started arguing with each other over the smallest things. Couples who had been together for years started breaking apart.

Cadance could feel it like a dark cloud hanging over the hamlet, an oppressive feeling of being watched everywhere she went, the eyes of the formerly-friendly ponies following her with thinly-disguised disgust.

Cadance found herself back out on the streets, a blank-flanked filly with no family or friends. Even the kindly couple that had raised her had been twisted, their love turning to hatred.

And that was when she appeared. Prisma. The ponies in town were too broken to stand up to her, blaming each other for tiny problems while Prisma fueled her dark magic on the disharmony she'd created in their hearts.

"I don't think that's actually possible," Sunset cut in. "Even if she was using chaos magic, the disharmony would be a side effect, not a power source. Traditional dark magic actually uses the negative emotions of the caster, not those around them, and—"

"I'm the one telling the story," Cadance pouted. "And I might not know a lot about magic, but she was definitely using evil spells."

"Fine, fine, keep going, even if it is totally inaccurate to the way that dark magic actually works..."

"So as I was saying..."

Prisma was a twisted, loveless witch of a unicorn who had been a criminal for as long as Cadance had been alive, using her magic only for personal gain. After being run out of every town she'd ever visited, she had turned to using dark magic, deciding to turn her talents from petty crime to true evil.

Cadance, for some reason, found she was the only pony not affected by the evil spell the witch had used to seal the hearts of the others. She was the only one who could stop her, but even then there was no guarantee that it would reverse the hate that had taken hold.

She confronted Prisma openly. With no knowledge of magic or tactics, all she could do was follow her heart and try to be brave.

Prisma focused all of her power on Cadance, trying to smash whatever protection it was that kept her dark magic from draining the love from the pegasus. But it wasn't enough. Cadance was like a bottomless well, and the more Prisma drained, the more love welled up to replace it. The spell Prisma used shattered, and the world turned white.

"And then I was an alicorn and I had my cutie mark!" Cadance finished.

"Just like that?" Sunset asked, raising an eyebrow. "You just... were an alicorn, no other explanation?"

"Well, I also got my cutie mark." Cadance said.

"I hate your story."

"There's probably a really good magical explanation that I don't understand," Cadance huffed. "The important thing is that I defeated Prisma using the power of Love. When it was all over, the ponies in the town were back to normal and Prisma turned over a new leaf and started helping ponies instead of hurting them."

"So you used mind control on her," Sunset concluded. "And rewrote her personality."

"No!" Cadance gasped. "That's not at all what happened! The power of love isn't like that at all. I didn't use my power to change who she was, I just brought out the good things that were already inside her."

"That's a pretty academic difference," Sunset retorted. "If she'd been a criminal for that long, isn't that who she really was?"

"It wasn't who she wanted to be," Cadance said. "Prisma had made mistakes, and she'd never had a chance to make up for them or be forgiven. I didn't change the way she thought, I just reminded her about what was really important to her."

"If you say so," Sunset shrugged. "I'm just not sure the power of love is really enough to stop dark magic."

"Well, that just shows how little you really know about love," Cadance said, smiling. "It can move mountains, drive ponies to madness, and makes life worth living. You want to get some space from Celestia, right?"

"Yeah...?" Sunset ventured. "Why?"

"We'll go out for a night on the town," Cadance said, wrapping a hoof around Sunset's shoulders and pulling her close. "I even know the perfect place to go!"

Chapter 11

Sunset looked over at Cadance, wondering why she'd agreed to this. Going out in the middle of the night was something she did, sure, but it wasn't to go and have fun. It was to hunt things that lurked in the shadows, or at least to study the stars. Sneaking out to one of Canterlot's nightclubs was pretty far removed from her usual ways to spend time, not least for the same reason she didn't go to restaurants. Showing up somewhere alone meant a whole night spent sitting quietly and watching other people enjoy themselves.

Not that she was alone tonight. She still wasn't sure the results would be far different.

"See? It's the perfect disguise." Cadance adjusted the big, floppy hat covering her horn, wide sunglasses hiding her eyes. If not for the fact that she was a head taller than most of the ponies around her, and the big crystal heart on her butt, one could almost (if they were generous) say that she was anonymous.

"You're kidding, right?" Sunset rolled her eyes. "I'm pretty sure ponies are bowing to you."

"I'm in disguise, Sunset. I didn't even bring my crown or anything!" Cadance laughed. "There's no way they can tell who I am if I don't have a crown on!"

"I didn't know that ponies only recognized you when you had your crown on," Sunset said, deadpan. "I wonder if Celestia ever goes out without her regalia and leaves ponies wondering if they recognize the pony three times their size from somewhere."

"Just remember to use my codename," Cadance said.

"I'm not going to call you Lovebutt all night."

"Spoilsport," Cadance said, sticking out her tongue. She led Sunset to a long line of ponies waiting to get into a club.

"We're going here?" Sunset asked, raising an eyebrow. "Isn't this a little... lowbrow for a Prin-"

Cadance coughed.

Sunset rolled her eyes. "For a fine, demure lady like you, Lovebutt?"

"Don't be silly. Places like this are fun! I'm not a million years old like Celestia, you know. I'm basically the same age you are, almost. Practically. Getting your cutie mark and the... other thing... at the same time sort of make biological age and stuff a mess."

"Uh-huh," Sunset said, getting more and more skeptical by the moment.

"The point is, I go undercover to places like this all the time. Sometimes I wear a long coat and pretend to be a unicorn. Other times I wear a hat and pretend I'm a pegasus! I could be anypony!"

"You could even wear both and pretend you're an earth pony," Sunset suggested.

"That's a good idea. I have to remember that one." Cadance nodded, approving of the suggestion.

"Stars save me," Sunset whispered.

"Come on. I bet two mares like us can get in without having to wait in line." Cadance made an exaggerated winking motion since Sunset couldn't see her eyes past the glasses. Sunset groaned and followed her to where a bouncer was standing guard at the door.

"Hello there~" Cadance purred. The bouncer's cheeks turned the same pink as Cadance's coat.

"Your highness! Please, come in." He stepped aside, gesturing for her to enter.

"Perfect disguise, huh?" Sunset asked. Cadance shooshed her.

"He's a bouncer. They're very observant. It's no surprise he saw through my otherwise perfect disguise." Cadance nodded at her own logic and walked inside, nodding to the bouncer as they entered.

Inside, it was very loud. There had to be some kind of silence spell bubble protecting the property values around the club, because as soon as Sunset walked past a blue line on the floor, the noise flooded her senses like a tidal wave, a bass beat thudding through her body like a second heartbeat.

"I love this song!" Cadance yelled, having to shout just to be heard. Ponies were packed in, a crowd dancing on a magically-illuminated dance floor while a raised seating area surrounded it on all sides, and a second level protected by mirrored glass hung over it all. The lights were low and multicolored, shining from improbable locations like a dark rainbow just below the surface of the club.

"What in Tartarus is that?" Sunset yelled back. She spotted the musician across the floor, a stallion behind turntables and a complicated looking piece of magitech with bubbling, glowing tubes and knobs.

"He's a DJ!" Cadance said, pulling Sunset towards the seating area. "LP is playing tonight! He's really great! He mixes classical music with contemporary stuff!"

Sunset thought she recognized Beethooven's Fifth, though usually it wasn't being played backwards and forwards at the same time while what sounded like several cats died horrible deaths at the hands of a brass section.

"Let's get some drinks!" Cadance suggested. Sunset nodded. When they got to a booth, the noise suddenly cut down to a more manageable level. Sunset looked down to find another painted circle on the ground. A second silence bubble, at a lower intensity.

"I'll need a drink to get through this," Sunset muttered.

"Great!" Cadance smiled. A waitress came over and Cadance leaned over, whispering into her ear. She nodded and left after a moment. "I ordered for you. I hope you don't mind."

"Considering both of us are incredibly powerful spellcasters, I don't think we're supposed to be drinking at all," Sunset noted. "There's a law against it. It's named after a nice round lake that used to be a distillery."

"With how today has been going, we can make an exception. It's either a celebration or a distraction or both." Cadance smiled. "Just try not to summon anything with an unpronounceable name."

"Be careful," Sunset warned. "I know beings who are so powerful they have over twenty apostrophes in their first name alone!"

Cadance laughed, and after a moment, Sunset joined her.

"So you really come here often?" Sunset asked, looking around.

"Yeah," Cadance said. "To be honest, I'm pretty sure they know who I am. Especially after I opened a tab and expensed it to the Crown."

"That would be a dead giveaway, yeah," Sunset snorted. Drinks were put in front of them, very large glasses with a half-dozen types of fruit around the rim and liquid inside in a variety of alarmingly bright colors that, even more alarmingly, did not seem to be mixing on their own.

"They're called Seapony Dreams," Cadance said, sipping on a curly straw protruding through the layer of fruit. "They're really good, and they have a kick like a mule with the strength of two mules."

"That description does not necessarily make me want to actually drink it," Sunset noted. She sipped at her drink and shivered. It was good, but something in her body could instinctively tell how much alcohol was in it. Thankfully, she often ignored the suggestions her body made, and took a quick second sip to let it know who was boss.

She looked up to see Cadance looking across the dance floor, her horn's light just visible from under her floppy hat.

"What are you doing?" Sunset asked, turning to look.

"Don't stare," Cadance warned. "I'm just helping a few ponies out. A little love magic makes a first date a lot less awkward."

"See, that makes it sound like mind control again," Sunset noted.

"It doesn't work if the ponies don't genuinely like each other," Cadance said, turning back to the table. "Like that griffon at the bar there. He just wants to get his beak wet."

Sunset snorted at the phrasing, her drink almost going up her nose.

"Not while I'm drinking!" Sunset coughed.

"But it was such a cute reaction! But I'm serious. He doesn't care about any of the mares here. Or stallions. He just wants to have some fun. There's no real love there, so my magic wouldn't help him at all."

"And you can tell that at a glance, with no spells?" Sunset asked.

"I'm the Princess of Love. It's my business to know." Cadance smirked. "Or... portfolio? Divine mandate? Royal right to butt in?"

"That just begs the question of why you don't have a coltfriend yourself," Sunset pointed out. "Unless you're just holding out for a perfect match."

"There's no such thing as a perfect match," Cadance shrugged. "Actually, given the right circumstances, I think almost any two ponies could fall in love. Ponies are such amazing, multifaceted beings that there's almost always some way that they can be compatible with each other."

"That's very romantic," Sunset said.

"It's true, though! The problem is, sometimes it would take a lot of work to make a relationship last. If you only love one thing about a pony, like their appearance, or their talents, or the way they preen your feathers, but you don't love the rest? It's hard to stay with a pony for any length of time if you have that little in common. On the other hoof, if you love somepony except for one or two little things, that's a small barrier to overcome."

"And so what was it with you? Seeing too many ponies that only love you for being a pretty face?"

"More like they loved the idea of me without loving me as a person," Cadance sighed. "Half of them think that because I'm the Princess of Love I'm also the princess of putting out on the first date."

Sunset snorted with laughter again.

"I'm serious! The closest I came to a decent date was with Shining Armor."

"Twilight Sparkle's brother?" Sunset asked, raising an eyebrow.

"That's the one. He was very polite. And very shy. That was the real barrier there - he never felt like he was worthy of dating me, and so he kept sabotaging himself." Cadance sighed. "It was nice for a while, but we started to grow apart because of Midnight. I didn't have as much time to foalsit his sister, we stopped seeing each other as often, and we eventually decided to just stay friends. I think it was a relief for him. The pressure between trying to date me and trying to get into the Royal Guard was making him crack. Maybe once some of the stress is gone we could try again but..."

"I'm surprised to hear the Princess of Love give up on a pony like that," Sunset said, after a moment of thought.

"It wasn't easy," Cadance admitted. "But it was better for both of us. But what about you? I bet you've had your eyes on some cute colts. Or mares? I don't know which you prefer, actually."

"I haven't thought about it," Sunset said, flatly. "Do you have any idea how little real free time I have? Between my studies and fighting monsters and taking care of Midnight, I haven't even thought about trying to date anypony - and don't you dare offer to set me up with somepony."

"Well, what about-"

"And when I say 'somepony', I don't mean I want you to try and find me a griffon to date."

"Aww. Spoilsport," Cadance teased. "Griffons are fun, though. Not much for serious relationships, but they are very passionate."

"I do not want details, Cadance," Sunset said. She took a long drag from her drink to try and erase the pictures forming in her mind.

"I never kiss and tell," Cadance said. "At least not without changing the names to protect the innocent. But if you don't want to talk about love, we can talk about something else."

"You could start by telling me how to get a pair of wings," Sunset said. "Like how you did it. It wasn't just because you wanted it enough. Celestia must have told you something."

"If there was a secret formula to it, I'd tell you in a heartbeat," Cadance said. "Celestia said even she wasn't sure of all the specifics, and you know she gets sort of vague and skips difficult questions."

"If she told you anything, it's more than I know," Sunset said.

"Well..." Cadance hesitated. "She said there are a few requirements. The first thing is that you need to have a high enough level of magical energy in your body to begin with. It's like how a fire has to have fuel to grow, right? If you don't have the magic inside you, even if you do everything else right, you couldn't get to that next level."

"I've got that," Sunset said.

"Definitely. I was strong for a pegasus, but even Celestia has said your magic is the strongest of any unicorn she's ever known."

"Flattering," Sunset muttered.

"The second thing that you need to become an alicorn is exposure to a huge amount of external magical power. Like Prisma's spell overloading in my face. I think between that and getting my cutie mark, there was enough magic all at once to fuel the ascension."

"So Celestia really could turn me into an alicorn?" Sunset asked.

"No, because there are two other requirements," Cadance sighed. "The third, as Celestia explained, is total understanding of yourself and your magic. You have to have a moment of total clarity. It's like when you find your cutie mark, that same sudden understanding of some important, defining part of yourself."

"And the last thing?" Sunset settled back into her seat.

"A great need," Cadance said. "You can't become an alicorn just from wanting it enough, or being strong enough, or studying all the magic in the world. I'm not sure exactly what Celestia meant, but... I think because harmony had been damaged so badly by Prisma, there was enough of a need for my love magic that I fulfilled the last requirement."

"Great," Sunset hissed. "And at least one of those can't be faked or worked towards in any constructive way."

"Well, I'm pretty sure hunting monsters down won't help," Cadance smiled faintly. "I think doing that was starting to make you lose sight of what's really important in life. I don't want you to end up bitter and alone like Prisma was."

"So what? I should go to bars and drink and date random ponies?" Sunset asked, obviously upset. "That can't be the answer."

"I think connections between ponies are important," Cadance said. "Alicorns represent all three pony tribes coming together in harmony. If it wasn't for the love I felt for the ponies around me, I don't think I would have been able to have that real understanding of myself that I needed."

"Bah!" Sunset scoffed. "I'll figure it out. And then I'll publish it so everypony knows how to become an alicorn!"

"I don't think there are a lot of ponies that can become an alicorn, even if they know how," Cadance said. "And if it really requires knowing yourself inside and out, well... it would be like trying to publish a book on how to get your cutie mark."

"I guess," Sunset sighed. "I just wish I could... figure it out. Then ponies would respect me for being me, not because I can be useful to Celestia, or because they're afraid of what I might do to them."

"I think the most important thing is that you keep trying to be a better pony," Cadance said. "You've really grown a lot ever since you started taking care of Midnight."

"Ugh. Half the time I feel like she's holding me back," Sunset admitted. "But at the same time, I couldn't ever just abandon her."

"Is that why you made sure she was set for the night before leaving her with the maids?" Cadance asked.

"And why I had a guard stay nearby in case the maid couldn't handle something," Sunset noted. "Midnight is a great filly, but I know how much trouble I got into at that age."

"Of course you remember. It wasn't that long ago. She's only about ten years younger than you are." Cadance smiled.

"Yeah, yeah," Sunset blushed and drank more, the flavor abruptly changing as she drained one layer and started on the next. "I mean she's already got a head start on getting Celestia totally flustered."

"Not that it's difficult," Cadance laughed. "I remember when Celestia first came to see me at the village, she was in disguise as a normal unicorn, and then she tried to be all impressive and regal at my parents and removed her disguise, but the ceiling was too low, and her head-" Cadance giggled so hard she snorted. "Her head went right through the roof and she got stuck!"

Sunset laughed hard enough that she had to put her head down on the table for a moment.

"That's- that's so her," Sunset said, between laughs. "I bet she tried to pretend it was a lesson, right? That's what she always did to me. Like she's really great at chess, but that's only because she spent a couple centuries memorizing all the openings. If you play any other board game, she's awful. Like this one time, we played Mareopoly-"

"No way," Cadance gasped. "That game is a friendship ender!"

"I got a lead early in the game, and she kept falling further and further behind. I offered to let her concede, but she thought she could turn it around. When we finally finished, she banished the game to the sun!"

"You're lucky she didn't banish you there." Cadance smiled. "You should have seen her when I went out on a date for the first time. It was with this cute filly that was working as a translator for the Zebrican ambassador."

"A filly, huh?" Sunset raised an eyebrow.

"As the Princess of Love, I feel that experimenting is an important part of life," Cadance said, turning up her nose. "I didn't get a second date with her, mostly because of Celestia. When I brought her back to the castle, she made us sit down and give us an hour-long lecture on the importance of safe sexual practices because she was sure that one of us would end up pregnant."

"But... you were both mares!"

"Given how the talk went, I’m not entirely sure Celestia was aware that mattered.”

"No wonder you didn't get a second date," Sunset muttered. "Do you remember when she was pink for a week?"

"Who could forget?" Cadance snorted. "She banned all cameras from castle grounds and refused to talk about it."

"Want to know how she turned pink?" Sunset asked.

Cadance gasped. "Isn't it treason to talk about it?"

"It's a state secret. I can tell you since you're a princess." Sunset leaned in and whispered something into Cadance's ear. The Princess' grin got wider and wider until she gasped and pulled away.

"She didn't! With the whole pot of pasta?"

Sunset nodded and leaned in, whispering again. Cadance burst out laughing and had to cover her muzzle with two hooves.

"No way," Cadance said, finally.

"I swear on my magic," Sunset said. "I saw the whole thing. That's also why she passed the legislation on truth in labeling and false advertisements."

"I can't believe you managed to keep that secret!" Cadance giggled again. "That's got to be the most ridiculous thing I ever heard!"

"Ponies probably wouldn't respect her as much if they knew about all the insane things she got up to," Sunset said.

"Maybe," Cadance agreed, sitting back. "We should really spend more time together. This is fun!"

"What we should really do is get another round of drinks," Sunset said, looking at her empty glass.

"A natural leader," Cadance said, nodding seriously. She raised her hoof and waved to the waitress. "Another round!"

Sunset groaned and rolled over. Her head felt like it had been bashed open with a golden brick wrapped in pegasus down. She was sure if she tried casting even a single spell it would make her entire horn shoot off like a rocket and explode.

Her bed was extremely comfortable, though, and she felt warm and safe. That was nice. Then her blanket moved, and light got into her face.

"Ungh... somepony close the curtains..." Sunset muttered.

"Sorry," groaned another voice. Sunset blinked, opening her eyes slowly and trying to focus. That voice had been very close-by.

"What?" Sunset asked, confused. "What are you doing in my bed?" She narrowed her eyes, trying to focus on the pink mass.

"Your bed?" Cadance asked, turning over. "Isn't this my bed?"

"No, it's..." Sunset looked around the room. Everything was pastel and pink. "It's your bed."

"I thought so," Cadance yawned, pulling Sunset closer. "Your bed is probably all scratchy..."

"Why am I in your bed?" Sunset asked, still too out of sorts to process what was happening.

"You're a really affectionate drunk," Cadance said. "You really started to open up after the third round, and then you admitted you'd never gotten a really good kiss, and then..." Cadance stopped and considered. "Then things get a little blurry."

"Did we make out while we were drunk?" Sunset frowned. "And why aren't you as hung over as I am?"

"Earth pony magic, They're immune to hangovers," Cadance yawned, not answering the more important question.

"Argh! I hate you," Sunset muttered. Cadance squeezed her. "Help me get to the shower. I still feel all sticky."

"That's from the whipped cream."

"What in Tartarus did we do last night?"

"I remember there was something with an ice cream sundae, and-" Cadance frowned and reached back to touch her own cutie mark. She winced. "Yep, you do bite too hard."

"Bite?!"

"I'll tell you in the shower," Cadance said, helping her to her hooves and bumping her flank against Sunset's as she walked towards the bathroom. "I don't want you to use up all the hot water~"

Chapter 12

Midnight looked in the mirror, turning her head from side to side and looking at her mane.

"Maybe I could make it a different color..." She considered. She stuck out her tongue and focused, her mane darkening a few shades almost to black.

"Ugh. No. That makes me look too sad." She released the spell, and it popped back to its usual color. She focused the spell in the other direction, and her mane brightened to a red-violet, closer to Sunset's mane color.

"Now I look like a clown." Midnight canceled the spell entirely. "Why is it that nothing goes well with purple?"

"You could try pink," Sunset suggested, from where she was reading through a book Cadance had given her. "You've already got a pink streak in your mane. You could just use that as a base."

"It's magenta, not pink. I checked with the pantone color book." Midnight tried to imagine what she'd look like with a pink mane. "And I don't think it'd look good."

"You could try a different style instead," Sunset said. "I mean I barely do anything with my mane."

"Mine doesn't curl up like yours, Mom. It just hangs all flat." Midnight sighed. "Do you think Cadance would let me borrow her hair spray?"

"If you told her you wanted a makeover she'd probably get so excited you'd end up spending all day forced to try on new dresses and makeup." Sunset snorted. "So if you want to ask her, be my guest."

"...There are spells that I can use instead, right?" Twilight asked.

"Sort of. They don't work as well." Sunset looked up. "Why do you want a new look so badly?"

"The foals at school keep thinking I'm Twilight Sparkle," Midnight huffed. "When we graduated magic kindergarten the teacher even gave me the wrong diploma!"

Sunset closed the book she'd been reading and stood up, walking over to give Midnight a quick hug. "That was an honest mistake, squirt. And if it's any consolation, I'm pretty sure she'd had a few drinks before the ceremony. She probably saw at least six lavender fillies."

"But she didn't get anypony else mixed up," Midnight mumbled.

"Maybe, but that's her loss. Years from now she's going to look back and think 'I should have treated Midnight better, because now she's rich and famous and the second-strongest unicorn in all of Equestria.'"

"Only second-strongest?" Midnight asked.

"Well, I'm still going to be around," Sunset grinned, poking her chest. "So you're going to have to work really hard if you want to have a chance at taking that title."

"Celestia did say that she was personally sponsoring me as a student for her school for gifted unicorns," Midnight said.

"Following in my hoofsteps," Sunset nodded. "Most students have to go through a bunch of exams just to get in. Of course, you've already been studying with her and me, so she can vouch for your talents. Means you don't have to sit around in line with the rest of them just to prove yourself."

"I could totally pass them if I wanted, though." Midnight was mostly trying to reassure herself.

"You'd pass them with flying colors," Sunset smiled. "That's why you don't have to bother with them. Most of the tests are really easy. They're just trying to weed out the students who don't belong."

"Like what? Unicorns who don't know anything about magic?"

"As an example? There's assigned reading, and questions based on that. If they didn't do the reading, it means they aren't serious enough about learning."

"Assigned reading?" Midnight stuck her tongue out.

"What, are you afraid of a little light reading?" Sunset teased. "I thought the glasses were helping with that."

"They do," Midnight said. "They help a lot. I don't get headaches when I use them. It's just that... if I have to read something, it isn't as fun as when I pick out a book for myself. Plus a lot of spellbooks are really hard to understand."

"That's because a lot of the books you borrow from me when you think I won't notice aren't written for fillies," Sunset said. "They're hundreds of years old and written back before inventions like algebra or the printing press or modern grammar."

"Grammar?"

"That's why thou find that thine books are so hard for thee to read," Sunset said, trying to emphasize ye olden wordings. "Pretty sure I butchered that. I'm awful with Olde Equestrian."

"Why hasn't anypony rewritten them to make more sense, then?" Midnight asked.

"They did. They'd be the books fillies your age are actually supposed to read. The ones you said were too easy and simple." Sunset smirked. "The old books sometimes have notes or spells that aren't reproduced in modern works, which is why I study them. It takes a lot more patience, though, because their spell formulas are based on old compass and straightedge constructions instead of modern runic formulas and geometry."

"What does that mean?"

"Without getting into the real details, they used geometric principles to get exact measurements and constructions. Like, you can draw a hexagon, right? A shape with six sides?"

Midnight nodded.

"There's a way to draw a perfect, exact hexagon using only simple tools. And you know how important hexagons are in spell construction. So a lot of these books, instead of printing a spell diagram - because this was before the printing press, remember - explain how to construct a perfect copy of a spell diagram using only the simple tools they'd have available at the time."

"That sounds really, really boring," Midnight said.

"Good thing you don't have to worry about that until you become a grad student," Sunset laughed.

Twilight Sparkle stared at the page in front of her. It contained the final question of the exam. She wasn't staring at it because she didn't know what to write in the space given. Quite the opposite - she'd answered it in seconds, expecting to find a more difficult problem on the next page.

But there wasn't a next page.

She glanced up at the clock. The proctor had told them that they had three hours to take the test, but only one had passed so far. The other students were hunkered down, still scribbling answers on their own exams.

Something was clearly wrong. If she'd finished this early, it meant that she had either missed questions or else she'd missed some vital part of the test. Twilight checked all the pages of the test, then her eyes went wide as she realized what she'd missed, and she flipped a page over to reveal...

Nothing. They were only printed on one side. And the numbers of the questions matched from page to page. She wasn't missing any questions after all.

Given that she had eliminated that possibility, that left only two explanations, both of them terrifying.

First, the questions could have included tricks that would only be apparent in a very careful reading. With only two hours left, she would have to start at a significant disadvantage if she had to answer all of the questions again just to make sure she'd examined all possible answers and dissecting the wording of the assessment.

Second, and this was almost too terrifying to consider, the other foals might simply be smarter than she was. If you asked a dull filly what color the sky was, they'd say blue. A smart one would tell you that the sky was blue, black, gray, orange, and a large variety of other colors depending on meteorological conditions and the time of day.

Given those possibilities, Twilight had to hope that it was the former rather than the latter. If she was really too stupid to understand all of the nuances around a given question, she wouldn't have any hope of answering it, but if it was just a matter of how the question was worded, she'd be able to correct that mistake.

She flipped back to the first question and got to work, making notes for herself in the margins as she re-read the test.

"Hey, Citrus Zing, can you take a look at this?" End Bell looked up from the tests he was grading and back at his colleague.

"Let me guess, one of the applicants tried writing Star Swirl the Bearded for every answer again," Citrus said, as he trotted over from his desk. "I have no idea how that rumor got started, but it's almost as amusing as the time a student taped a fifty-bit note to the test to try and get a better grade."

"No, no. It's a bit strange," End Bell said. He tapped the test he was looking at. "You took theoretical thaumatic physics, right?"

"Well, I don't like to brag, but I do have a PhD," Citrus said. He leaned in to look. "Ah, I see you gave this to one of the grad students, and they answered the question using relativistic equations instead of just adding vectors. It is more exact that way, though it only matters in large ritual spells where there's enough magic to actually warp space-time. I know this because, and I'm not sure if you knew this, I have a PhD."

"That's what I thought," End Bell muttered. "Is this right?"

"Yes, though..." Citrus narrowed his eyes. "I don't recognize this part. It looks like this student tried to rationalize the complex part of the equation using a negative eigenvector... Which grad student filled this out? I've never seen this technique, and I have a PhD."

"It wasn't a grad student."

"We'll be dividing the applicant pool into three groups," the proctor said, looking at a list in her hooves.

After the test, they'd taken a break for lunch while the staff graded the results. Twilight looked up from where she was sitting with her parents.

"Please come forward when your name is called," the proctor said, and started reading off a list of names. "Trixie Lulamoon. Sunburst. Lemon Hearts..."

"What do you think the groups mean?" Twilight whispered.

"They're probably divided based on how well they did on the test," her mother said. "So that means whichever group you're in must be the really high achievers." She smiled and booped Twilight's nose, making the filly blush.

"Mom, stop it." Twilight said.

"Twilight Sparkle," the proctor said. Twilight jumped to her hooves, looking around, then trotted quickly to the front of the room, standing next to the blue-coated filly she'd gone to magic kindergarten with.

"Good luck, honey!" Night Light said as she left.

"All of you, please go with Peach Brandy," the proctor said, pointing to a pink mare off to the side of the room. "She'll be taking you to the practical portion of the exam."

Twilight nodded and followed the rest as Peach Brandy led them out of the common room.

"Well, this must be a big day for you colts and fillies," Peach said, happily. "Big group this time, too! Usually we don't get quite so many at the high end of the bell curve."

"You mean... we did okay on the tests?" Twilight ventured.

"Of course," the blue filly in front of her huffed, her head held high. "They were nothing for an intelligent and well-educated filly like me."

"Now, you're all basically going to be doing the practical exams alone," Peach Brandy said. "Part of the test involves learning a spell on the spot and demonstrating it, so please don't discuss the test after you've taken it. Otherwise others will get an unfair advantage."

Twilight nodded.

"Just don't be nervous. Given your test scores, you've all got the theory part of it down, so you just need to show that you know the practical basics that you got in magic kindergarten."

Peach took them through a corridor towards the classrooms. Twilight could picture it on the map of the school she'd memorized. After getting badly lost in Canterlot castle, she'd developed a habit of making sure she studied a map of every place she was planning to go.

"Classroom 2-A, Classroom 2-B..." she muttered under her breath, naming the rooms as they passed to keep herself calm.

"You'll all be waiting in here," Peach Brandy said, opening the door to one of the smaller classrooms. "Feel free to sit anywhere. If your parents were able to come to your entrance exams, they'll be invited to come to your test."

Twilight looked around the room, then picked a seat near the door. She wasn't sure if she wanted to get it over with so she could be done with it, or if she wanted to hide in the room and never face the possibility of failure.

"Just don't get too comfortable," Peach warned. "I'm going to let them know that you're all ready for your practical exams, and then I'll come back and get one of you."

She left the room, and Twilight was alone. Somewhat alone. There were almost a dozen fillies and colts in the room, but she sure felt alone.

Sunset watched as Midnight twirled around the room, her horn lit up and her hooves just barely glowing.

"See?" Midnight said, smiling. "I figured out that I can use the floor polishing spell the maids use to reduce friction between my hooves and the ground so I can slide around!"

"It reminds me of ice skating," Sunset said, smiling. "And you came up with that on your own?"

"Basically," Midnight said. "In dance class they make everypony wear these slippery socks to keep our hooves from scraping the floor. When the teacher's not looking, sometimes we see how far we can slide."

"And you used this spell to slide even further?" Sunset asked, smirking.

"I might have made a few mistakes with how much power to use at first," Midnight admitted. "I sort of broke a mirror when I couldn't stop myself."

"That's bad luck, you know," Sunset said.

"But you broke a mirror when you made me. Does that mean I'm bad luck?"

"No, it means all the luck got sucked right out and went in here!" Sunset grabbed her and pulled her close, ruffling her mane with her hoof.

"Mooom!"

"Sunburst and Twilight Sparkle, if you'd come with me?" Peach said.

"I thought we were going to be called one at a time?" Sunburst asked. He stopped to let Twilight go first as they walked to the door.

"I got a note from the chair that you were to report to room one, and a second room would be opened for Miss Sparkle's exam," Peach said. She shrugged. "They never do things the same way twice around here. I should be used to it at this point. Maybe they saw we had a big group and they wanted to get the tests done more quickly."

"Y-yeah..." Twilight muttered. What if they were just going to tell her that she wasn't really qualified? Getting special attention never meant anything good. Was she a problem student? What if they saw how messy her hornwriting was and made her go back to magic kindergarten because they couldn't read anything she wrote?

Peach opened the door for her, and she walked inside, already sweating and nervous.

"Well, I guess I could teach you one of my favorite spells, but you have to promise to use it responsibly," Sunset said. "And don't tell Celestia you learned it from me."

"What is it? Is it combat magic?" Midnight asked, eagerly. "You could teach me how to fight monsters and then we could do it together!"

"No, it's even better," Sunset said. "This spell is simple, but extremely versatile, and I use it almost every day." She set a jug of water and two cups between her and Midnight. "Taste the water."

Midnight lifted the cup to her lips and sipped. It just tasted like normal water, with a slight mineral tang that meant it came from the local mountain springs.

"It's just water," Midnight shrugged.

Sunset lowered her horn to the cup and cast a quick spell, the water flashing for a moment with the cyan color of her magic. "Try it now."

Midnight tilted her head and sipped again, her eyes going wide. "Apple juice?" She sniffed at the cup. "But it doesn't smell like apple juice."

"I used a spell to change the flavor. You can make anything taste like anything else. It's the only way to get through some of the really awful dinners that Celestia has, like that thing with the vegetables in a jelly mold."

Midnight shuddered at that. "Ew. That stuff is so gross!"

"It's a lot better when it tastes like fruit instead of carrots and peas," Sunset said. "Now, just copy what I'm doing..."

"Well, initially I tried using the algebraic equations," Twilight said, trying to keep her stammer under control. "B-but I wasn't sure that the answer would be what the test really wanted, because the algebraic equations are only accurate in an idealized euclidean plane."

"So you used the relativistic equations instead?" Citrus Zing asked, taking notes.

"Yes," Twilight said. "They're more accurate, even if in most cases using standard reference frames they only differ by a small amount."

"I see. And can you explain why you used a negative energy flow to remove the complex part of the equation and rationalize it?" Citrus Zing asked.

"It's obviously a negative flow," Twilight said, frowning. "If it was positive, the limit of the equation would tend towards infinity."

"But it implies that the sum of all real numbers is a negative number!" Citrus Zing retorted.

"I had a proof of that, but it wouldn't fit into the margins," Twilight whispered, blushing. "Do you have a chalkboard?"

Midnight took a sip of her water and gagged.

"I did it wrong!" She gasped, spitting it out. "It tastes like lemon juice!"

"That's closer," Sunset said. "At least it's a fruit. And better than making it taste like vomit."

"Why is it so hard? It looks like an easy spell," Midnight said.

"It is an easy spell," Sunset agreed. "But it's also very sensitive, mostly because it's simple. You could make a much more robust spell that makes everything taste like cake, for example, but it wouldn't be able to make things taste like apple pie. This spell is a lot simpler, but more of it relies on intent and concentration. You have to apply your will to it instead of just letting the magic do its own thing."

"So you have to... make it work?"

"Something like that," Sunset agreed. "Some spells are a science, but this one is more of an art. Most illusion spells are the same way."

"Okay, so I just have to focus, and make the spell work..." Midnight whispered, closing her eyes.

"Citrus, this is supposed to be a practical exam," End Bell whispered.

"Hold on, let me just finish writing this down," Citrus muttered. "I need to run this by the Dean of Invisible Runes to see if-"

"I think," End Bell said, clearing his throat and speaking more loudly. "That fully satisfies all the questions we had regarding the irregularities on the test."

"Hm?" Citrus asked, blinking. "Yes, right." He finished his notes.

"Miss Sparkle, are you ready for the practical exam?" End Bell asked. She nodded. "Excellent. First, please create a simple illusion, if you can. The one from the required reading will be sufficient."

Twilight focused, her horn flickering. It felt like her magic was fighting her, like the energy was being pulled elsewhere. She frowned and closed her eyes, forming the spell. She didn't need that much power to get the illusion going.

A point of light appeared in front of her. Then a second point. The two were joined in a line. A parallel line appeared, and more lines joined the two, forming a square. The square extended into a cube.

"Lovely work," End Bell nodded. "Not the fastest I've seen the illusion put together, but very precise."

Twilight let the spell go, the magic immediately flowing away, like water being drained away. Something was wrong.

"Midnight, are you okay?" Sunset asked. The aura around Midnight's horn flickered and waned.

"I don't know," Midnight admitted. Her aura suddenly stabilized, and the spell she'd been trying to cast collapsed.

"Let's stop for a minute," Sunset said, standing up. She raised Midnight's head and looked into her eyes. "Your pupils look fine." She looked closely at Midnight's horn. "And I don't see any cracks or blemishes on your horn. Did you hit your head lately?"

"No," Midnight said. "Dance class has been helping a lot with that. I'm not as clumsy as I used to be."

"Then it must be something else. Just lift your cup with telekinesis so I can examine your magical flow."

Midnight nodded and held it up, the cup wobbling slowing in her unsure grip. Sunset started casting diagnostic spells, trying to track down what was wrong.

"I don't see anything wrong with your leylines. The magic has to be going somewhere. Magic doesn't just vanish." She frowned. "There has to be something else..." Sunset cast another spell. "It's being drawn right from your wellspring. I can't tell where it's going. I've never even seen anything like this."

"M-my magic is going away?" Midnight asked, dropping the cup.

"We just have to figure this out," Sunset said, trying to sound reassuring. "It might be nothing."

Twilight felt the pressure pulling her magic away suddenly stop, and she sighed, relieved. She'd need all the magic she could get for this next test.

"Go ahead and light the candle, Miss Sparkle," End Bell said. Twilight looked up into the seats. Her mother waved down to her, and Twilight smiled slightly. She could do this. Even if she wasn't usually allowed to play with fire, heat and light were the most basic forms that magical energy degraded to - it was why miscast spells often ended in explosions.

Twilight focused magic around the candle and just let it collapse inwards. There was a flash of light, and a tower of flame for a moment before leaving a stump of a candle sitting in a pool of molten wax. It was, however, lit.

"Ah, yes. I suppose that meets the requirements," End Bell muttered.

"I just don't know what's wrong," Sunset hissed. Celestia looked at the closed door and then back to Sunset.

"The most important thing right now is for you to remain calm," Princess Celestia said. "No matter what's happening, Midnight needs you to be strong for her. Maybe it's nothing, or maybe it's something serious, and either way she'll feel better if you're there for her."

Sunset's ears folded back. "I know."

"Come on, we'll solve this mystery," Celestia said, smiling slightly. "She might just be a little under the weather."

"That's evocation, illusion, conjuration-" End Bell muttered, flipping through the pages.

"Good work banishing the demon before it could do any harm," Citrus Zing noted.

"You have no idea how often that happens around here," End Bell sighed. "We're not testing transmutation. Not after the one applicant turned himself into a newt. Divination next?"

"What, with the cards with the stars and wavy lines and such?" Citrus asked. "That's a bit old-fashioned, don't you think? I didn't even have to do that, and I have a PhD."

"It's a traditional test. Tradition is important."

"Now just stay still, Midnight," Celestia said, as her golden magic gently probed the filly. "My spell confirms your findings, Sunset. Her leylines feel normal. Nothing damaged or blown out."

"What about..." Sunset leaned in to whisper. "Horn rot?"

"Sunset, horn rot is just a myth," Celestia snorted. "Horn rot isn't real, and it certainly doesn't happen when you... spend time with yourself."

Sunset blushed. "R-right."

"Am I sick? Is it a monster, or a curse, or a curse monster?" Midnight asked, getting more and more upset as her mind conjured up worse fates for herself.

"I know of no monster that could or would do something like this," Celestia said. "And there's no dark magic that could indicate a curse. If anything, it feels like spells are being cast, but the magic isn't going into your leylines, but instead it's finding some other exit."

"A couple of wavy lines. Circle. Star. That one is wavy lines again but you switched it for a square when I wasn't looking," Twilight said, her eyes closed.

"Er... yes. Those are all correct," Citrus Zing said. "Next we will.. we will..." He looked over his testing packet. "What do we have left?" He whispered.

"We've got that one test," End Bell muttered.

"What one test?" Citrus asked.

"You know. That one." He leaned in. "With the egg."

"But that's impossible, even for me," Citrus hissed. "And I have a PhD."

"She doesn't know that," End Bell said. "It'll let us see how much magical power she really has. The results have been all over the place in terms of overall strength."

"Alright, alright. I'll get the stupid egg."

"Are you sure this is wise?" Sunset asked, as she drew a line across Midnight's snout with red paint. "I've never even heard of drawing a divination circle onto a pony."

"It's an old technique," Celestia admitted, as she touched up runes near the base of Midnight's left forehoof. "Before more advanced diagnostic spells were invented, doctors would use chained divination spells. The idea was that they could get an idea of what treatments would work for the patient by looking into the future and doing whatever would help them, even if they didn't understand how or why it worked."

"Really?" Midnight asked. "So it'll tell you how to help me?"

"It's sort of a last resort," Celestia said. "It won't tell us what's wrong with you. It might tell us you need warm tomato soup and to sleep on a bed made of pegasus down, but it won't tell us why the soup will help, or why the bed can't be made of clouds."

"But you'll feel better," Sunset assured her. "We can figure out why later."

Twilight looked at the egg, then back at the professors. The egg was almost as big as she was, and she had no idea what she was even supposed to do with it.

"Just try to hatch it," End Bell said. "All it requires is a significant burst of magical energy. You don't need to form it into a spell, just direct it at the egg."

"O-okay," Twilight said, unsure. She started pulling at the magic inside her. She was going to need every last scrap of her power if she wanted to have a chance at this.

Midnight gasped, almost falling over. She could feel her magic being drained away, with such sudden force that it was making her shake.

"I-it's happening again!" Midnight said, starting to go pale.

"Celestia!" Sunset yelled, holding Midnight up. The filly looked like she was going to faint.

"It's like all of her magic is..." Celestia frowned. "Why does this seem familiar?"

"Am I going to die?" Midnight whispered.

"No, no," Sunset said, holding Midnight up. "Of course not. You're going to be fine. Just stay calm, and we'll figure this out."

"B-but I'm not even a real pony," Midnight said. "I'm a magical thing a-a construct, right? If all my magic goes away, I'll vanish!"

"You're not going to vanish, Midnight," Sunset said, pulling her into a tight hug. "I won't let you."

Twilight strained, her horn sputtering. She needed more power, and the last bits of her magic were fighting her, trying to hang on to where they'd gotten stuck. She could feel something inside her stretching, and she wasn't sure what was going to happen. All it would take was one, small-

An explosion of sound and color shattered the sky.

The bottom seemed to drop out of Twilight's wellspring. She'd thought she'd found the limit of her power, but she had been wrong.

Sunset was thrown back as a powerful aura overtook Midnight, blazing around her with almost impossible strength.

"What's happening?!" Sunset yelled. A bolt of blue lightning shot over her head and slammed into the wall. A chair across the room suddenly popped like a bubble, leaving a large teak-paneled frog in its place that hopped out of the window.

"It's a magical flare!" Celestia said. "I can suppress it, I just need a moment to contain the magical energy."

The castle shook, and something roared. Celestia turned to the window. Halfway across the castle grounds, a dragon's head poked out of the top of one of the towers of her school.

"There's another flare coming from that direction," Celestia said. "They must be related."

"You think?!" Sunset yelled. "Whatever's over there must be what was draining Midnight's magic! You go deal with that! I can't fly, and teleporting through that much random magical interference is impossible!"

"But-" Celestia looked at Midnight.

"You said I needed to be strong and I needed to be there for her, right? So just let me take care of her."

Celestia hesitated, then nodded. She stepped to the window and launched herself into the air, aiming for the source of magic burning within her school. Sunset watched her go, then turned to Midnight cautiously.

"Midnight, I don't know if you can hear me, but I promise you'll be okay. I'm going to make this okay." Sunset stepped closer. She could feel the magic pushing against hers, like walking into the wind. It was strong enough that the pressure against her own natural aura was actually starting to force her back.

"You have to stay calm," Sunset said. "I know it's scary." She forced herself closer. She'd only felt an overwhelming aura of power like this once before, from Celestia. Her instincts were screaming for her to run away, but Sunset didn't get to playing around with the laws of nature by doing what her instincts told her. Midnight's life was at stake and that meant it was time to do something impossible and stupid.

Sunset pulled Midnight's aura into her own, draining the excess, dangerous magic away.

"Come on..." Sunset gasped, as Midnight's magic fought against her. It was like trying to swallow liquid fire, the foreign magic tearing through her leylines, the force threatening to rip her body apart.

"You aren't going to beat me," Sunset growled. The aura around Midnight started to dim, the gap between their powers widening. The flare hit Sunset's wellspring like a punch to her chest, making her heart seize for a moment. She coughed at the abrupt pain.

"M-mom?" Midnight asked, weakly.

The flare cut out, the magical burst petering out. Midnight dropped to the floor. Sunset backed up, stumbling into a wall and sliding back, her legs shaking too much to support her body.

"Mom?" Midnight asked again, concerned.

Sunset coughed, a tongue of flame erupting from her breath, the excess magic turning to fire as soon as it left her body. She tried to answer Midnight, but couldn't catch her breath. She looked down at her hooves with wide eyes. Her leylines were visible to plain sight, glowing like cyan veins of light just under her skin.

"Just-" She coughed, the flame weaker this time. "Just give me a moment. I'm okay."

"What happened?" Midnight asked, still afraid.

"You had a magical flare. Celestia went to figure out why." Sunset took a deep breath, which dissolved into painful coughs, her chest tight. "Looks like between the two of us we managed to do it."

Midnight stood up and stared walking closer, looking up at her mother. "B-but are you really okay? Did I hurt you?"

"What, with a little magical flare like that?" Sunset smiled weakly. "Don't be silly." The leylines on her body finally started to die down, and Sunset could feel the pain fading as the extra magic was forced into submission. "See? Right as rain."

"A-am I going to be okay? I won't vanish?" Midnight asked.

"Better than that," Sunset smiled. She pointed at Midnight's flank.

"I got my cutie mark!" Twilight gasped, hopping in a circle and looking at the six-pointed star on her flank. Her sense of euphoria lasted for another ten seconds before she realized where she was and what had just happened.

Celestia waited patiently while Twilight looked around at the destruction she'd caused. The hole in the roof, broken windows, burn marks littering the room. At least her parents weren't houseplants anymore.

"I-I guess I'm in a lot of trouble," Twilight whispered.

"For something outside of your control?" Celestia smiled. "No, of course not. You know, the kind of power you displayed is something I've only come to expect once a generation."

"Really?" Twilight asked.

"And this answers quite a few questions I was asking myself earlier today. If your parents will allow it, would you come with me for a moment? I think I'd like to..." She paused, considering the best way to put it. "I'd like to prove a hypothesis."

"I can't believe it!" Midnight said. "I really have a cutie mark... that means I'm really a pony after all!"

"I could have told you that years ago," Sunset laughed. "Of course you're a real pony." She hugged Midnight, trying not to lean on her. Her legs still felt like they were full of jelly, and her back hurt like crazy. She'd probably come close to blowing out all of her chakras.

"But this proves it," Midnight said. "What do you think it means?"

"Well, a six-pointed star is an old symbol that represents magic's six branches. Evocation, Abjuration, Conjuration, Divination, Transmutation, and Illusion." Sunset smiled. "If I had to guess, I'd say you have a talent for magic."

"Really?" Midnight grinned widely.

"And if that's a big surprise to you, maybe you need stronger glasses," Sunset smirked, booping Midnight's nose.

"So, it looks like my guess was correct after all," Celestia said, as she walked into the room. From the doorway, instead of the balcony. "I see you have things well in hoof here."

"Well, I am an expert in dealing with magical disasters," Sunset said. "Seeing as how I'm usually the one causing them."

"I was afraid you wouldn't be able to disjunct the flare," Celestia admitted. "I underestimated you."

"Disjunction..." Sunset muttered. "That... would probably have been a good idea. I sort of wish I'd thought of it."

"You didn't use a Disjunction spell? Then how did you get Midnight's flare under control?" Princess Celestia looked confused, surprised enough by the answer that her expression managed to sneak past her usual mask.

"I just sort of... took the extra magic into myself. I figured it would be easier for me to get it under control than for her to do it."

"That was extremely dangerous," Celestia scolded. "You could have been killed! Taking the magic of another pony into your body... especially a flare..." She shook her head.

"I managed," Sunset countered. "So what was causing all the trouble?"

"H-hello," Twilight Sparkle said, coming out from where she'd been hiding behind Celestia.

"Of course," Sunset groaned. "Of course." She buried her face in her hooves. "Why didn't I see that coming?"

"I forgot about it myself," Celestia admitted. "It isn't common knowledge, especially since unicorn twins are so rare."

"Twins?" Midnight asked. "But we're not twins! I have a cutie mark and she doesn't!" Midnight grinned and showed it off.

Twilight's jaw dropped, the other filly turning to display her own flank. With the same cutie mark.

Midnight's expression fell, and she turned to Sunset.

"It really does explain everything," Sunset sighed. "Identical unicorn twins sometimes share a pool of magic."

"Twilight Sparkle was going through the entrance examinations for my school for gifted unicorns," Celestia continued. "She was using more magic more often than she ever has before. Because you were trying to learn a spell at the same time she was, both of you ended up fighting over the remaining magical pool once your reserves had gotten low enough."

"And the biggest sign that you share a pool of magic is the identical cutie marks," Sunset said. "They're tied directly to your magic. Same cutie mark, same magical source."

"But which one of us got it first?" Midnight asked. "Does she have my cutie mark, or am I stuck with her cutie mark?!"

"Shining Armor has a six-pointed star in his cutie mark, so it must be mine," Twilight said. "That means yours is just a cheap copy because you stole my magic!"

"I got mine first!" Midnight yelled. "I'm not just a copy of you! I'm a real pony! It's just a symbol for magic!"

"Girls," Celestia gently interrupted. "You're taking this the wrong way. Neither of you is a copy or a double. Twilight didn't steal anything from you, and you didn't steal anything from her."

"But if we share a magic pool it means I can't even cast spells right because she can use it all up!" Midnight protested.

"It's my magic to use," Twilight huffed.

"You aren't rivals, and you shouldn't look at this as a curse," Celestia said. "You two share a wonderful, magical bond that most ponies will never be able to understand. This will allow you to achieve more, not less, especially with the right training."

"But..." Midnight whimpered. "It means I only have, like, half as much magic as before."

"It's more like... you have your magic, and Twilight has her magic, and then they got put together," Sunset said. "It's not that you have half as much magic as you thought, it's that you have twice as much magic as you would without Twilight." She looked to Celestia for confirmation.

"That's right, Sunset," Celestia smiled. "In fact, this would have been noticed much sooner, but you both have so much more magic than the average pony that you simply never noticed before."

"S-so there's special training we have to get?" Twilight asked. "I don't remember anything about magic from twins being special in any books that I read."

"There aren't many teachers that would know how to help you," Celestia said. "But I think I can be of some assistance. I'd like to invite you, both of you, to become my personal students."

Sunset looked away, her eyes going wide.

"Sunset," Celestia said, gently. "You've already exceeded every expectation I've had for you. You don't need me as a personal tutor anymore. You've shown me that you've grown as a pony, and you've continued to grow even in places where I've failed to teach you."

"So I'm... done?" Sunset asked, her voice fragile.

"Nopony is ever done learning. I believe Cadance mentioned in passing that she had some personal lessons that she wanted to coach you on."

"But I mean..." Sunset hesitated. "I just..."

"You didn't fail, Sunset. You graduated, and I'm going to be very interested to see where you go from here."

"I just... need a little while," Sunset said, closing her eyes.

Celestia nodded. "When you're ready, talk to me."

Sunset nodded tersely, then vanished in a flare of crimson light. Celestia sighed as she felt the castle's wards shatter, again. It seemed like she couldn't go a week without having to repair the magical defenses.

"I'm not going to play along with you," Twilight whispered.

"That's fine," Midnight said. "I'll show you that I'm way better at magic than you are."

"Come along, girls," Celestia said. "I'd like to talk to your mother about boarding arrangements, Twilight, and I think it would be best to leave your mother alone for a bit, Midnight."

"Is she mad at me?" Midnight asked.

"No," Celestia said, leaning down to nuzzle her for a moment. "She's just... dealing with a big change. More than one of them. You're growing up, and so is she."

"What was the big rainbow thing in the sky?" Twilight asked.

"A very good question," Celestia smiled. "I think I'll have to investigate that myself. I'm not quite sure what it was."

"I bet it was aliens," Midnight said.

"No way," Twilight scoffed. "It was probably a part of the flare's magic going back in time and causing its own genesis! Predestination paradox!"

"Or it could have been a secret pegasus weather weapon!" Midnight gasped. "With hypnotizing rainbows!"

"That's stupid," Twilight snorted, as they walked back towards the school. "Pegasus doomsday devices always have lightning, not rainbows."

Chapter 13

Princess Celestia smiled as Night Light and Twilight Velvet signed the scroll in front of them.

"Thank you," Celestia said. "It'll be much easier on Twilight if she boards here. Of course, you're welcome to visit any time you wish. Most students that attend here aren't lucky enough to have family in Canterlot."

"We already discussed things, and we want to do what's best for her education," Velvet replied. "She's a very special filly, after all."

"Yes she is," Celestia agreed.

"Now, we've got a celebration to plan," Night Light smiled. Then his gaze went wide, unfocused. "And houseplants to water. Always so thirsty-"

Velvet elbowed him in the side.

"We'll make sure Twilight is ready for things next week," Velvet said. "Is there anything we should pack for her?"

"Everything she'll need will be provided for her," Princess Celestia said. "But I find that most students enjoy having some of the comforts of home. A favorite blanket, a few toys or books, that sort of thing."

"And, um, what about..." Night Light looked nervous. "The dragon?"

"Ah, yes," Celestia smiled. "Twilight hatched him, so she is responsible for him. I'll be helping her, of course, but it wouldn't be the first time I helped one of my students with an unexpected responsibility."

"You mean Sunset Shimmer, and her daughter." There was a slight but noticeable pause before she said daughter, as if Velvet hadn't been sure it was the right word.

"Yes," Celestia said, her expression falling slightly at the thought of her now-former student. "Though Sunset was older and more capable of taking care of a filly. I'll be assuming most of the responsibility for ensuring the dragon is taken care of until Twilight is old enough to handle it herself. A filly her age shouldn't be changing diapers, after all."

"How dangerous is it?" Night Light asked.

"A baby dragon?" Celestia smiled. "Not at all. She's safer with him than she would be with a puppy."

"Really?" Night Light asked. "But the fire, and claws-"

"He won't be able to breathe fire for years, and it will be even longer before his claws stop being blunt. It will be no more difficult than taking care of a normal foal."

"You say that like taking care of a foal is easy," Velvet said. "They need a lot of attention and love."

"More than you expect, sometimes," Celestia agreed, a faint frown on her lips.

Sunset knocked on the door lightly. She hadn't been able to walk all the way across the castle. Even if her legs couldn't support her, she was able to teleport there in a few short hops and avoid any chance of running into Celestia.

She'd also ended up destroying the castle's anti-teleport wards again. She was sure whatever unicorn kept replacing them hated her. The one time she'd had to help out it had left her with a migraine for a day and a half.

"Coming!" Came a voice from inside the room. After a few moments, the door cracked open, revealing a pastel pink pony standing in a pastel pink room.

"Hey, Cadance," Sunset said, weakly.

"Sunset?" Cadance blinked. "What's wrong?" She helped Sunset inside, putting a wing around her to help support the unicorn. She closed the door behind them and led Sunset to a couch, sitting her down.

"I just... didn't know where else to go," Sunset admitted. "I didn't want to go back to my room. Has Celestia come by to tell you about all the great news?"

"No," Cadance said, cautiously. "But you don't look like she'd actually have great news to give me."

"She found a new personal student. Two of them." Sunset laughed harshly. "And apparently that's more students than she needs, so she decided to kick me out."

"It was that weird magic from before, wasn't it?" Cadance asked.

"Midnight got her cutie mark. So did Twilight Sparkle. The same cutie mark."

"That can happen?" Cadance blinked. "I've seen similar cutie marks in families, but-"

"They got the exact same cutie mark, at the same time. I guess that was enough of a curiosity to make Celestia take them in." Sunset shrugged. "I knew Midnight was going to be her student, but I didn't think..."

"You didn't think Celestia would be finished teaching you," Cadance finished, quietly. She got up on the couch and sat next to Sunset.

"Yeah," Sunset said. She put her head down, exhausted in every way a pony could feel exhausted.

"This isn't the first time you've felt like this, either," Cadance said. "Though last time I remember you being more angry than depressed."

"That's because last time, it was you."

Sunset Shimmer scribbled on a scroll without looking. She was trying to translate some older writings from Clover the Clever into modern Equestrian, but it wasn't going well. Sunset was starting to suspect there was nothing wrong with her translation, and that Clover had just managed to write an entire essay on magic without really saying anything at all. Maybe she was being paid by the word.

"Sunset?" Asked a voice from the door to the library.

"Hello, Princess," Sunset said, without looking up. "Are you back from that emergency meeting?" She hadn't been told what it was about, but that wasn't surprising. Princess Celestia was called to a half-dozen 'emergency' meetings every day, most of them about such important topics as the price of tea in Hippon or a need to name a new battleship.

"Yes," Celestia said, with a happy tone in her voice that Sunset rarely heard after one of her meetings. "And I've brought somepony with me that I'd like you to meet."

Sunset sighed and put her quill down. She'd probably have to spend a few minutes exchanging pleasantries with whatever diplomat Celestia had dragged out to meet her.

She turned, and her eyes went wide.

Standing next to Celestia, looking shy and bashful, was another alicorn. If Sunset was the kind of pony to think things like 'oh no, she's hot', she'd be thinking it.

"What? I- what?" Sunset sputtered.

"I'd like you to meet Mi Amore Cadenza," Celestia said. "She hasn't had her coronation yet, but I wanted you to be the first to meet Equestria's newest princess."

Sunset swallowed, feeling faint. Her eye twitched, from a combination of eye strain and a sudden massive knot of stress in her chest.

"I- I see." Sunset said.

"I hope you two become friends," Celestia continued. "I know there aren't a lot of ponies your age in the castle, but Cadance is a very nice young mare, and I think you two have a lot in common."

"It's a pleasure to meet you," Cadenza said. "You can just call me Cadance. I don't like using my full name."

Sunset threw a book into the box, then kicked it across the room. She'd cleaned off her bookcases, putting everything that was hers in one box and everything that needed to go back to the castle library or be thrown away in another.

The box that she'd put her own things into was depressingly empty. Part of that was that Sunset didn't want anything that reminded her of Celestia.

"Sunset," said a voice. Not from the doorway, but from just inside. Sunset turned, surprised. Celestia had come in without knocking. Nor, apparently, did she use the door. Sunset could still sense the fading magic of a teleportation spell.

"Princess," Sunset said. "Why are you here?"

"Because I was worried about you," Celestia said. "And I see I was right to be worried." She picked up the letter Sunset had set off to the side.

Sunset looked away, blushing, as Celestia read over the short, polite, but very terse letter.

"You want to resign as my student?" Celestia asked. She didn't sound surprised about the contents.

"You don't need me anymore," Sunset muttered. "You've got a perfect student now, and ponies are already falling all over themselves trying to make her happy."

"A perfect student?" Celestia shook her head. "I already had a perfect student, Sunset. That's why I wanted to be your personal teacher."

"And now you have Cadenza!" Sunset snapped.

"I don't accept your resignation," Celestia said, tearing up the letter. "For one thing, you're not old enough to go out on your own. More importantly, it would be a terrible disservice to you to let you go."

"You can't make me stay here," Sunset said.

Celestia sighed and knelt down, getting on Sunset's eye level. "I can't make you stay," she admitted. "But I don't want you to go. I promise, Sunset, I would never just replace you like that."

"So much for that promise," Sunset muttered.

"Did she actually say that she wasn't going to teach you?" Cadance asked. "No offense, Sunset, but sometimes you overreact to things."

"She said she was done teaching me," Sunset said. "She tried to say she'd taught me everything she could and I'd graduated, but it sure is convenient that I graduate at exactly the same time she decides to get a new student." Sunset snorted. "Two new students."

"What's a good dragon name..." Twilight considered, as she watched the little purple wyrmling suck on an emerald.

"Crimson Death!" Midnight suggested. "Or maybe something with a lot of hissing sounds. Is it a boy dragon or a girl dragon?"

"...I don't know," Twilight said. "How do you tell with dragons?"

"Mom would probably know," Midnight said. She frowned. "I hope she's not angry about everything that happened."

"Probably not," Twilight shrugged. "I turned my mom into a fern and she wasn't angry after she got changed back."

"I'm told being a fern is very calming," Celestia said, as she walked into the sitting room. "Twilight, your parents have agreed to let you board at the castle. I'm very excited to have you with us."

"Thank you, Princess," Twilight smiled. "Um, could you help me come up with a name?" She looked at the dragon hopefully.

"This little one is your responsibility, so I can only give you a few tips," Celestia sat down. "First, remember that whatever name you give him, it's the name he'll have to live with for the rest of his life, and dragons live a very long time. Make it something that you won't regret in a few years."

"How am I supposed to know if I'll regret it though?" Twilight frowned.

"Well, I wouldn't name him after a pony," Celestia said. "Young dragons usually have short names like Spark or Talon. Then as they get older, their name grows along with them."

"Something short..." Twilight considered. "What about Spike?"

"Spike is a fine name for a young dragon," Celestia said. "And far less likely for him to grow to dislike than, say, naming him Posey or Scalebutt."

Twilight giggled at the suggestions, and Celestia smiled along with her.

"Thank you, Princess," Twilight said. She glanced back at Midnight. "Um, can I ask a question?"

"Of course, Twilight," Celestia said. "You're one of my personal students now. There's no question you should ever be afraid to ask me. I don't have every answer, but I'll always try to point you in the right direction."

"Well... I didn't see her at the school for the tests." She frowned at Midnight.

"Midnight Twinkle was exempt from the admissions tests," Celestia said. "The tests are largely so the teachers can gauge the ability of the applicants. Since I knew her personally, there was no need to have her take those tests."

"But..." Twilight frowned more. "Then why did I have to take the tests?"

"Because I didn't have a chance to know you beyond a few chance meetings," Celestia admitted. "I had a feeling you would rise to the top, and the results have proven me correct with flying colors."

"It's not fair," Twilight said, firmly. "I had to do a lot of work, but she didn't have to do anything, and we're basically the same since she's a copy of me."

"Twilight, she's not a copy of you. Midnight is her own pony."

"But you know what I mean!" Twilight huffed. "I did all that work, and she didn't do anything, and we ended up in the same place!"

"Ah," Celestia said, nodding. "I see the problem. Twilight, sometimes work is worth doing just for itself. Do you know you got the highest result on your written tests that we've ever seen?"

"The highest?"

"The highest," Celestia confirmed. "Your intuitive grasp of magical theory is very impressive."

Midnight coughed. Celestia and Twilight turned to look at her.

"Well, I don't like that Twilight gets to be your student," Midnight said, bluntly. "Twilight, even if you did really well in tests, I was already learning with Princess Celestia and my mom, and now because of you, Celestia doesn't want my mom anymore!"

"Midnight, that's not true," Celestia said. Midnight ignored her and kept talking, getting more and more upset as she went.

"Why is it that I'm not good enough on my own? And what did mom ever do to make you want to get rid of her? Are you just- just going to get rid of me too?"

"Midnight," Celestia said, firmly. "Calm down. I didn't dismiss your mother, and I..." Celestia took a deep breath. "Sunset Shimmer is like family to me. There's just nothing more I can teach her. You wouldn't want to be stuck in magic kindergarten forever, would you? Once you learn enough, you need to grow and move on to something better. It was just time for Sunset to do the same."

"But you didn't even give her warning or tell her anything!" Midnight protested.

"I wasn't expecting it to happen today," Celestia admitted. "Sunset has been ready for a long time. After what happened with both of you having a magical surge and earning your cutie marks, I knew it was a sign that the time had come."

"She's not very happy about it," Midnight muttered.

"No, she isn't," Celestia said. "Change is scary for anypony, no matter how many monsters they fight or how many spells they know. Even I get scared by change."

Midnight sniffled and rubbed her snout. "It's just- it's not fair. I don't want mom to be sad because of me."

"Don't blame yourself," Celestia said.

"You should just have one of us as your student, and then mom wouldn't need to go!" Midnight said.

"Taking only one of you as a student wouldn't change my decision about Sunset Shimmer," Celestia said. "She needs to get out from under my shadow and grow on her own. She's beyond the point where she needs to prove anything to me. She has to prove it to herself, and a pony can't do that just by following orders."

"But..." Midnight huffed.

"And," Celestia continued, after a moment. "If I had to choose only one of you, I would choose Twilight Sparkle as my student."

"What?" Midnight gasped. "But I was already your student!"

"And as Twilight Sparkle has pointed out, she has worked harder to get where she is. Even if your talents are equal, Twilight has done more to apply herself."

Midnight seemed on the verge of tears.

"But it wouldn't be fair to either of you," Celestia concluded. "You're linked, deep inside. And as I said, you each have an equal amount of talent. If I only taught one of you and not the other, I'd be letting that talent go to waste, and I'd be guilty of keeping you both from reaching your full potential." She looked at both of them evenly. "You two are far greater together than you are apart. The same is true of most ponies, but it's especially true in this case."

Sunset leaned into Cadance, trying to relax.

"You know, you could always move in with me," Cadance suggested. "The maids could get your things, and I could order the guards to keep Celestia out. We'd have to leave some of the taxidermy. The stuffed bugbear gave me night terrors for a week."

"You say that like they could stop her," Sunset snorted.

"They'd try really hard," Cadance said. "I mean I do have the same authority as Celestia. In theory. Do you think it would cause a civil war?"

"Cadance you could cause a civil war by batting your eyelashes at the troops too hard," Sunset smirked. "They'd start fighting each other for your attention."

"Too bad you're the one who has it," Cadance said. "They don't have a chance. You'd just blast them all the way to Manehattan."

Sunset blushed. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"Nothing," Cadance said, coyly. "But maybe once you're feeling a little better we can go make the troops jealous."

Sunset snorted, and a sudden pang in her chest turned it into a hacking cough, making her curl up.

"What's wrong?" Cadance asked, concerned. Her concern grew as cyan lines flowed over Sunset's body for a moment like she was burning from within.

"Nothing!" Sunset spat harshly, obviously in pain. Smoke escaped her lips, making her cough again.

"This isn't nothing. We need to get you to a doctor." Cadance started to stand. Sunset pulled her back down.

"No. I just need a minute..." Sunset shuddered in pain and calmed herself, the light fading. "I'm fine. I just need to sleep it off."

"You don't look fine," Cadance whispered, fretting. "What happened?"

"I'm just having a great day, is all," Sunset said. "I had to absorb a lot of magic to keep Midnight from hurting herself. It's like magical indigestion. Painful and embarrassing but not really dangerous. Probably."

"Probably?" Cadance asked.

"Well I haven't exploded yet so I should be fine," Sunset shrugged. "I just need time for my body to process the extra magic."

"You're not allowed to move in if you're at risk of exploding," Cadance said, poking Sunset gingerly. "I can get a little wild, and the last thing I want is to have to explain to the maids why my bed's on fire."

"I get a very strong feeling that it's not the strangest thing you'd have to explain to your maids," Sunset snorted. "Besides, I don't even know what we are yet."

"Well, we're not enemies," Cadance said.

"And we're not family," Sunset noted.

"I hope not. Otherwise what we did would have been a little taboo." She wiggled her eyebrows. "I know what I want us to be."

"If you follow that up with some kind of double-entendre, I'm going to set your mane on fire," Sunset said, opening an eye to glare at Cadance.

"You ruin all of my fun! But we could at least be friends. With benefits."

"You're not going to immediately suggest we run off and get married?" Sunset asked, mildly surprised.

"I think we need to work on being friends first. We've got a good start, though, and you're fun to spend time with once you stopped being grumpy at me." Cadance smiled softly. "But you know, if you did want to elope, I'd have to say no."

"Owch," Sunset winced.

"You're emotional and upset," Cadance said. "It's not the right time to make big life-changing decisions like getting married or blowing up all of Canterlot in a revenge fantasy, or using age spells and mane-dye to pretend to be a third lavender filly with a talent for magic."

"That thing with the explosions sounds kind of nice," Sunset muttered.

"Maybe, but Midnight would be really sad if you turned into a supervillain," Cadance said, nuzzling Sunset's neck. "You need a few days to calm down, and I'm going to help you do it."

Cadance leaned in closer, her lips nearing Sunset's. Just as they got so close they were nearly touching, a knock at the door interrupted them.

"Every time," Cadance muttered. "I swear I should be the Princess of Ponies Always Walking In On Her." She got up. "I'll get it. If it's Celestia, should I..."

"I don't want to talk to her," Sunset said, quietly.

Cadance nodded and opened the door.

"E-excuse me, Princess Cadance? Princess Celestia said mom might be here." Midnight looked up at her, obviously afraid. "C-can I come in?"

"Of course you can," Cadance said, ushering her inside and closing the door behind her. Midnight spotted Sunset on the sofa and ran over, coming to a halt just short of her mother.

"M-mom?" Midnight asked.

"Hey there," Sunset said, forcing a small smile. "Big day for you, huh? We're going to have to plan a party."

"Are you mad at me?" Midnight asked, her voice on the edge of breaking. "I didn't mean to- to have all that happen!"

"Am I-" Sunset sighed and sat up slowly, pulling Midnight up on the couch with magic before hugging her. "Not at you. You're still my cute little filly. You didn't do anything wrong."

"But I hurt you," Midnight whispered.

"You were hurting yourself," Sunset said. "And I did what I had to do to save you. I'm a little sore, but like I keep telling everypony, I just need to sleep it off. It's like eating something bad and getting sick from it. You feel awful for a day or two, then it's out of your system."

"That's not what I mean," Midnight said, quietly. "I hurt your feelings."

"Are you kidding?" Sunset snorted. "Do you know how proud I am of you? I knew you were strong, but that blew my expectations right out of the water. And you got your cutie mark in magic!" Sunset smiled. "You're taking after me, so I must be doing something right."

"Twilight has the same cutie mark, though," Midnight said.

"So what? Her brother didn't go to Celestia's school. Her mom didn't. But I did. And you're taking after me, so that means she's the one copying you." Sunset ran a hoof through Midnight's mane, straightening it out. "Don't you ever forget that."

"You really mean it?" Midnight asked. "You're not mad and- and-"

"And you're the best little filly. I've even got objective evidence to prove it. But that doesn't mean you're allowed to slack off. Even if I'm so mad at Celestia I could-" Sunset trailed off, composing herself. "She's still your teacher, and I want you to do your best."

"I will," Midnight whispered. "I promise."

"Good," Sunset nodded. "Now what should I get you as a present... maybe a nice pen and notebook?"

"Or a book of forbidden spells!" Midnight suggested.

"I'm not getting you a black magic grimoire," Sunset said. "I still don't know how you snuck that one out of the library. You remember what I told you?"

Midnight sighed. "Don't read books that are whispering in your mind, especially if they're written in suspicious-looking red ink."

"Good." Sunset yawned. "I think I need a nap. I could get an early start on sleeping this stupid magic indigestion off."

Cadance watched quietly as Sunset fell asleep on her couch, Midnight curled up next to her and joining her in slumber almost as quickly as her mother passed out.

The pink princess sighed, quietly. She didn't want to wake her guests. After what both of them had been through, they needed the rest. Cadance was tempted to just leave them there and go out to give them some privacy, but there was something else that concerned her.

She saw a flash of yellow light from under the door and opened it before the pony there could knock.

"Cadance," Celestia said. "I assume Sunset is here?"

"You already knew that, since you sent Midnight to find her," Cadance pointed out.

"It's still polite to ask," Celestia said. "May I come in? I'd like to have a word with my former student."

"No," Cadance said.

"No?" Celestia repeated. "I'm surprised at how often my requests are being denied in these last few days." She sighed.

Cadance stepped out, closing the door behind her. "She doesn't want to talk to you right now, and I think it's for the best. Sunset is really upset, you know."

"I know," Celestia said. "That's why I wanted to talk to her. I need to clear the air and fix this. I don't want hard feelings to fester between us." She sighed. "It's not right."

"No, it isn't right," Cadance agreed. "Why have you been dropping things in her lap lately? You know better than anypony that Sunset gets emotional, especially regarding you."

"I didn't mean to upset her so badly," Celestia whispered, closing her eyes. "I thought if I made her a Duchess she'd be happy about it. I was going to make her my advisor, and have her take over the running of the Court."

"That's not what she really wants," Cadance said.

"I know," Celestia replied. "But I can't give her what she really wants. You know that becoming an alicorn isn't something anypony can do, nor is ascension a gift I can give out. If it was, I wouldn't have lost so very many friends to time."

"That's not what I mean." Cadance shook her head. "I mean, yes, she wants to be an alicorn. But that's not what she wants from you. Not what she really wants, anyway."

"Then what does she want?" Celestia asked. "I'd do anything for her. You know that. Money? Power? Knowledge? I've tried to give her everything she doesn't already possess."

"She wants a family, Celestia," Cadance said, firmly. "It's why Midnight is so important to her, and why she cares so much about you. You raised her like a daughter."

"Cadance, there are reasons for what I do," Celestia said. "There are long-term plans that I have for her, and they'll all turn out for the best, for her and all of us."

"Do those plans include breaking her heart and sending her to throw herself against every monster lurking in Equestria's shadows until she ends up dead?" Cadance asked.

"She wanted to fight those monsters," Celestia said. "Despite the danger."

"She was trying to please you!" Cadance retorted.

"Sunset has very rarely disappointed me. I've always been proud of her. And if she was here, taking care of day court... she wouldn't be as motivated to put herself in danger."

"So you are worried about her," Cadance whispered.

"Of course I am," Celestia said, sharply. "She's almost died a half-dozen times. Even with Midnight waiting for her, it didn't stop Sunset from trying to throw her life away."

"Did you ever tell her to stop?"

"No." Celestia looked away. "There are certain foes that the Royal Guard simply wasn't prepared to face. I could have fought them myself, but..."

"But Sunset was eager and able," Cadance finished.

"Protecting ponies is one of the most important things a Princess can do. And part of me hoped that... she just needed to face some great foe and conquer them to achieve her potential."

"Celestia," Cadance sighed.

"I wanted her to be happy. And she did save the lives of many. She just never managed to connect to any of them." Celestia looked at the closed door. "There are ponies that are as scared of her as they are of any monster. When I made her a duchess - and I have not changed that decree - a dozen ponies came to the court to protest it. And those were just the ones willing to challenge my decision to my face!"

"Why?" Cadance frowned.

"Because she won't play their little political games. She doesn't play by any rules at all except her own. They couldn't threaten her in any way, and none of them have anything she wants."

"Are you implying Sunset Shimmer couldn't be corrupted?" Cadance snorted.

"I'm saying that they don't like having a new noble, above them, whom they have no leverage on," Celestia said.

"No one except you would have leverage on her, you mean," Cadance corrected, poking Celestia's chest with her hoof. "Since she'd do almost anything for your approval."

"The thought had crossed my mind," Celestia admitted.

"So what are you going to do now?" Cadance asked. "What's the big plan?"

"...I'll take your advice and leave her be for now," Celestia said. "I've hurt her, and she needs time to heal. Just... please let her know that I'm sorry?" She looked at Cadance with a faint expression of sorrow hiding just behind her features.

"I'll tell her," Cadance promised.

"So what did she want?" Sunset asked, when Cadance came back in.

"She wanted to say sorry," Cadance said, trotting over to the couch and getting up to sit next to Sunset, looking over her to make sure she wasn't disturbing Midnight.

"Sorry isn't always enough," Sunset muttered.

"Sunset, if you want to leave, you can," Cadance said. "I can take care of Midnight while you're away."

"I'm not going to abandon her," Sunset said. "Do you know what she'd think if I left? She'd think I was leaving because of her."

"So instead you're going to stay for her?"

"It's better than leaving," Sunset said. "I wouldn't know where to go, anyway. I don't have family waiting for me in some fishing village in the middle of nowhere."

"Prance," Cadance said. "It's in Prance. And you could visit, if you want. Get to know my folks. I could introduce you as my new lover. They wouldn't think it was awkward at all."

Sunset snorted. "I'd get run out of town with torches and pitchforks."

"Don't be silly. They're nice."

"That's why they wouldn't tar and feather me first." Sunset smirked. "I'm staying, and that's final. And you know I'm too stubborn for you to change my mind. Besides, you'd miss me too much."

"Well, I suppose," Cadance admitted. "You are one of my best friends."

"Good." Sunset yawned. "Now just stay there. I needed a pillow." She rested her head on Cadance, nuzzling her as she got comfortable. It would have been almost romantic, if she hadn't started snoring.

Chapter 14

Aside from garden parties, the other type of celebration that was generally approved of by the nobility of Canterlot was the formal ball, all of which followed the same general rules - everypony was expected to dress to some sort of theme determined by the host, there would be dignified (meaning dull) music played throughout, and there would be a dance at some point, so ponies were expected to either bring a date or else attach themselves to one of the eligible singletons who had come looking for their own partner.

One might be forgiven for thinking that this meant that a ball was a romantic occasion. In truth, the pairings that were established rarely lasted past the end of the ball, and some dissolved even faster once one of the two involved revealed on the dance floor that they had four left hooves and no right steps at all.

The Autumnal Equinox Ball was one of the most formal balls of the year. While the Grand Galloping Gala was the place to be seen by up-and-coming ponies, the Equinox Ball saw far more foreign dignitaries and the noble and diplomatic elite. This time, it was also a way for Celestia to introduce her new students to what she generously called the most powerful ponies in Equestria.

It would be more accurate to say they were the ponies with nothing better to do than try to look and act important, which meant Celestia wasn't entirely wrong. One wrong rumor could destroy a pony's reputation, and they were exactly the sort to spread a rumor they'd heard only in the vacant echoing inside their skulls.

Sunset shifted her shoulders as she walked, trying to get comfortable in the dress she had been stuffed into. Like every year, the theme revolved around the changing of seasons, and the entire ballroom was a mass of orange, red, and brown. It was probably the only place where her fiery mane and orange coat would actually blend in.

"Thanks for coming, Mom," Midnight whispered, at her hooves.

"I wasn't going to make you come alone," Sunset said. "I know how it can be when you're stuck in a place like this alone and without somepony to help you get through it."

"Yeah, but... I know you don't really want to see Princess Celestia." Midnight looked across the room to where Celestia was greeting guests. Sunset had taken them around to a different entrance and gotten in without passing by. It was less showy than a teleport, and less likely to end with their dresses on fire.

"I can put up with being in the same room as her for your sake," Sunset smiled. "Besides, this is one of those responsibility things. I've had to attend dozens of these things, so I'm basically an expert at this point." She winked at Midnight.

"When do they start getting fun?" Midnight asked. "All the other ponies look like they're having fun. Except Twilight."

Midnight's double was standing near the buffet table with her parents, mostly hiding behind her mother and avoiding the crowd. She kept looking under the table as if she was considering crawling under it and hiding.

"That's a very good question," Sunset muttered. "I'll let you know once I figure that out myself."

"Ah, Duchess Shimmer," a voice called out behind them. Sunset's eye twitched at the title, but she put on a smile and turned.

"You must be... Jet Set, I believe?" She asked. "I think we were introduced once at the Gala."

"You do have a good memory," Jet Set said, smiling calmly. "I wanted to congratulate your foal. Celestia's School is one of the most exclusive institutions in the world."

Sunset smiled a little more genuinely. "Thank you. Midnight, this is Jet Set."

"It's a pleasure to meet you," Jet Set said, bowing slightly to her. "I'm sure you'll excel under the Princess' tutoring."

"It's nice to meet you too," Midnight said.

"If you'll excuse me," Jet Set nodded. "I'm going to go congratulate the other lucky parents. Do you want anything from the buffet table?"

"No, we'll be making our way over there ourselves soon enough," Sunset said. "Thank you, though."

Jet Set nodded and left. Sunset watched him go and breathed a sigh of relief.

"He was nice," Midnight noted.

"He also called me Duchess Shimmer," Sunset replied, quietly. "So I'll see how long it takes before he asks me for a favor. I'm betting it'll take him a few glasses of wine, but maybe he'll try sending a letter."

"Maybe he was just being polite," Midnight suggested.

"Maybe," Sunset said, smiling slightly. "I guess I'm just not as nice as you are, squirt."

"Can we go get a drink?" Midnight asked.

"Of course we can..." Sunset started, then saw that Princess Celestia had started on her way over to the buffet table. "After we check on Cadance." Cadance was safely on the opposite side of the ballroom, the dance floor in the center of the hall effectively forcing polite ponies to circle around.

"Okay," Midnight sighed. Sunset gave her an apologetic smile and slipped further away from Celestia, trusting that Twilight and her parents would delay her.

"Princess Cadance," Sunset said, as she walked up to her. Even Cadance hadn't managed to get away from the ball's theme, wearing a dress of pale peach colors with a crown of bronze and gold leaves.

"Sunset!" Cadance smiled. "I didn't see you come in."

"We sort of used the back door," Sunset said. "So who's this?" She looked at the griffon that Cadance had been speaking to.

"General Koloth," the griffon said, offering a talon. Sunset shook it. "I've heard you're the resident monster hunter. I'm curious about what kind of monsters ponies hunt. Perhaps large soft ones that hide under foal's beds?"

"You ever heard of a bulette?" Sunset asked. "Big as a house, scales made of iron, burrows underground and likes to eat anything screaming."

"Sounds like a fine hunt. Of course, not as difficult as a roc-"

"A roc?" Sunset snorted. "Please. They're just big birds. I don't worry about fried chicken like that. Now a Dullahan, they're interesting. Undead creature, like a headless zombie but much tougher and smarter. Almost unstoppable unless you know what you're doing."

The griffon smiled. "When this is over, I'd like to have a few drinks with you. The atmosphere here isn't right for tales of battle, and the wine is far too weak."

"Only if I'm invited too," Cadance said, smiling and looking at Sunset.

"I didn't know that kind of story interested you," the general said, raising an eyebrow.

"I'm very interested in all of Sunset's stories," Cadance said, stepping a little closer to the unicorn. The griffon looked between them for a moment, then guffawed, shaking his head.

"I should have known," Koloth said. "Don't get your feathers ruffled, girl. I'm too old for that kind of thing, and too married. My wives would gut me if they thought I was unfaithful, and I could hardly blame them."

"What does he mean, Mom?" Midnight asked.

"Nothing you need to worry about," Koloth said. "A fine young foal. If she's half as strong as her mother, I'm sure she'll be a mighty warrior."

Midnight smiled at that. "Thank you, sir."

Cadance laughed and nudged Sunset. "Come on. Midnight keeps looking at the buffet table like she's going to pounce on it. You should get her something to eat."

Sunset looked across the room. Celestia was still there, talking to Twilight and her parents.

"Why don't you take her?" Sunset suggested. Cadance followed her gaze and sighed, but nodded.

"Come on," Cadance said, giving Midnight a small smile. "Why don't we get you some punch and a little snack?"

Sunset nodded when Midnight looked at her for permission, and the filly followed Cadance around the dance floor to the long table. It was stocked with the kind of largely harmless treats that one would expect at a diplomatic function - miniature apple tarts, trays of vegetables both raw and cooked, unidentifiable spreads on various crackers, and so forth.

"Hello, Princess," Midnight said, as she approached the huge mare. Celestia would have loomed over even a fully-grown pony, so to a filly like Midnight, she was more or less as big as the castle (give or take a few orders of magnitude).

"Ah, Midnight," Celestia smiled down at her. "I was hoping we'd run into each other."

"Are you having fun?" Midnight asked. "I asked Mom when these balls start being fun, and she didn't know."

"Ah, well..." Celestia looked around, then ducked her head, weaving a quick spell to give them some privacy and keep her words from traveling. "The truth is, while I might hold these balls, they aren't for me. They're for the other ponies. The form and events are all traditional, as is the menu. I don't think anypony would want to eat maple leaves otherwise, even if they are fried and dusted with sugar."

"So it really isn't fun for anypony?" Midnight frowned at that. "But then why do they do it?"

"Tradition. It's the strongest force in the universe. Sometimes I'm convinced gravity only works because it's traditional for things to fall down instead of up."

"But you're a Princess," Midnight pointed out. "You can just do anything you want. You could make this fun if you wanted, and then you'd have a new tradition that wasn't as boring."

Celestia smiled. "Maybe you're right." She stood back up, ending the privacy spell as Cadance brought over punch and a small plate.

"Here you are, Midnight," Cadance said. "Auntie, are you sure you shouldn't stand at the door all night waiting for late arrivals?" She smiled slightly.

Celestia returned a sweet smile. "You could take over for me."

Cadance laughed. "Maybe next time. Midnight, why don't you say hello to Twilight?"

Midnight nodded and trotted over to Twilight, starting an awkward conversation about how she'd been asked to start a conversation.

"I hope they learn to get along," Celestia sighed. "A talent for magic and a shared magical pool... they could have an incredibly bright future, if they work together."

"And if they don't, they'll end up like me and Sunset," Cadance agreed. "Well, how we used to be."

"Hopefully not how you are now," Celestia said, whispering slyly. "Though many stallions do dream about twins in that way..."

"Auntie!" Cadance gasped, blushing.

"Hm?" Celestia tilted her head innocently. "I meant best friends, of course. Or is there something I should know about your relationship with Sunset Shimmer? I hope you're not doing anything unbecoming of a princess."

"Of course not," Cadance said, looking away. It was a good thing her cheeks were already pink or else ponies might know she was fighting back a blush.

"Princess?" Twilight asked. "I was talking to Midnight. You're in charge of everything, right?"

Celestia nodded.

"Can you make the musicians play better music? They've been playing the same song over and over again and it's really boring," Twilight said.

"Better music? Do you have any requests?" Celestia asked.

"Maybe something fun so we can dance to it?" Midnight suggested. "I don't really like slow dances."

"Ah, yes. I think I can manage that," Celestia smiled.

Sunset watched as Celestia passed a message along to the band playing. There was a moment of silence as the bassist read the note, then a moment of discussion among the musicians while they passed the note around, and they broke out into jazz. At least, Sunset assumed it was jazz, since it didn't sound like they were all playing from the same musical score.

Celestia took to the dance floor with Midnight and Twilight, and they started dancing. Well, it could generously be called dancing in the same way the notes that the musicians were playing could generously be called music (it was, regardless of any musical pedigree, still jazz, since playing jazz did not in fact require you to play music or even know how your instrument is even supposed to be played).

"How awful," a voice to Sunset's right said, just loudly enough to carry to everypony around him. "That's so undignified. I always knew my aunt should have never taken in any of those foals."

Sunset turned slowly to look. A young stallion was looking at the dance floor. She recognized him instantly. The young Blueblood, recent inheritor of his father's title as Prince, and less worthy than even that pompous mule had been.

"She could be teaching me, or children from noble families. The true leaders of Equestria." Blueblood scoffed, shaking his head. "Foals like that shouldn't be allowed at the ball."

One of the ponies between Sunset and Blueblood felt her coat starting to stand on end and turned slowly to look, the same careful movements as a prey animal knowing that a predator was right behind them.

She spotted Sunset and backed up, getting out of the way, as if (wisely) afraid that Sunset might just blast anything getting between her and Blueblood.

"I mean, she's not even a real pony, from everything I've heard," Blueblood confided in the pony next to him. Sunset was too focused on Blueblood to even recognize the pony he was speaking to, her tunnel vision locked on the white coat and blond mane in front of her.

"My sources tell me she just keeps causing disasters at the castle. The statue thing, that event with the dragon, and even more than that," Blueblood concluded. "She's just a construct, a fake. Really, she should be studied in a lab or locked up, not taught."

Every wine glass within ten paces cracked. Blueblood paused to look down at the cracked glass on his hand, slowly dribbling wine onto his hoof.

Sunset stalked towards him and it was only because the castle used marble floors instead of cheap linoleum that her hoofprints weren't burned into the tiles as she crossed the distance. Ponies started getting out of the way. If nothing else, ponies had a great survival instinct. Most ponies. Blueblood apparently hadn't inherited that.

"What awful luck," Blueblood sighed, dropping the wine glass on the tray of a passing maid, the wine spilling and ruining the food she'd been carrying to the buffet table.

"Ah, Prince Blueblood," a pony next to him hissed.

"What is it?" Blueblood asked. "Speak up! I can't understand a word you're saying over that awful noise."

"I just think you might want to apologize for saying such things about a foal. She's a cute, innocent little filly."

"Cute? Innocent?" Blueblood scoffed. "For all we know, she's some demon from Tartarus pretending to be a pony. It would fit with her so-called mother."

A pony near Sunset squeaked and jumped back as a spark of errant mana grounded itself on her hoof. The temperature of the air in the room started to increase.

"I'll just let you handle this, old boy," the pony next to Blueblood said, patting him on the shoulder and, wisely, leaving quickly.

"Handle what?" Blueblood asked, finally turning around. When he saw Sunset, his expression changed from haughty indignation to something approaching concern. He opened his mouth to say something.

A magical grip slammed his mouth shut. Luckily, he didn't bite his tongue. He looked across the dance floor to Princess Celestia.

She shook her head helplessly and shrugged, turning away. His gaze turned back to Sunset and he looked into her eyes.

It's said that the nature of mortality is one of the greatest mysteries left in the world. At the moment Blueblood looked into Sunset's eyes, he saw, for just an instant, the very edge of life and death.

Blueblood, already white, couldn't exactly go pale, but his cheeks did manage to tinge a slight shade of unhealthy green, perhaps from seeing his life flash before his eyes and the sheer amount of drinking he'd managed to fit into his few adult years.

"I think," Sunset growled. "That you should apologize. My daughter is just a filly and doesn't understand that you were just making a joke, and I wouldn't want her to get upset."

"Y-yes," Blueblood agreed, once his heart had started working again. "We wouldn't want anypony to get upset."

"Well?" Sunset asked.

"I apologize," Blueblood said, starting to sweat. He took a step back. Sunset took a step forwards. The musicians started to slow down, the ones not playing instruments large enough to hide behind looking for the nearest appropriate cover.

"You look tired," Sunset said. "Maybe you should leave."

"Maybe I should leave," Blueblood repeated, quietly. He backed up a few more steps before turning and walking more quickly towards the exit. He was muttering to himself as he left, swearing revenge under his breath now that he was far away enough that he might be able to escape.

Sunset watched him go, and the dangerous aura around her slowly faded. She looked at the ponies around her.

"So, how about that fall weather?" She suggested. The nobility quickly jumped on that new topic, talking amongst themselves about the change of seasons and letting her slip away.

The ball continued for a few more hours before it seemed polite enough for ponies to start leaving. Twilight and her parents had been among the first to leave, wanting to get their filly back home in time for bed.

"Mom, I'm tired," Midnight yawned.

"You two don't have to stay here for me," Cadance smiled. "I'm stuck here until the last guests leave."

"I guess I should get her to bed," Sunset agreed.

"I was hoping we'd be able to talk before you left," Princess Celestia said. Sunset winced. She'd managed to avoid her all night, and she'd been snuck up on at the last minute. She'd been on the other side of the room just a few moments ago. Either Sunset was more tired than she thought or else Celestia had cheated and teleported when nopony was looking.

"Princess," Sunset said, formally, without turning to face her.

"Sunset, please?" Celestia asked, quietly. "I just want to talk, and to apologize."

Sunset finally turned, sighing. "Fine. I guess I can't avoid it since I'm still living here."

"If you don't want to talk, I can leave," Celestia said. "I don't want to force you to do anything. I just wanted to... be able to talk. You're dear to me."

"Yeah, just like all of your little ponies," Sunset rolled her eyes.

"Considerably more than that, and you know it," Celestia corrected her. "You were always my most passionate student, and you've been able to rise to any challenge before you. I care about you."

"And that's why you kicked me out?" Sunset asked. She managed to avoid spitting, if only because there were still a few guests around.

"I'm not kicking you out," Celestia said. "You're welcome to stay here for as long as you want. I'd prefer keeping you close, in fact. I wanted to make you a job offer, but you... weren't in the right mood to hear it."

"I've already got a job. I track down monsters and turn them into taxidermy."

"That's a hobby," Celestia smiled. "I was thinking of something more challenging. I want you to take over running day court."

"You- what?" Sunset sputtered.

"Not every day, but it would give you more exposure. And as a Duchess, I'd like to point out that they're your little ponies too, not just mine." Celestia looked to the windows. "I know you've been isolated. There aren't a lot of ponies close to you, especially not outside of the castle. Running the court would give you a way to meet them, and to get them used to the idea of following your orders."

"Following my orders?" Sunset repeated. Then she snorted and looked away. "Maybe you should have Cadance running Day Court, then. She could use more responsibility."

"She'll have all the responsibility she can manage, eventually," Celestia said. She smiled at Cadance. "And she's been doing a wonderful job as ambassador."

"It is kind of nice going to new places and meeting new people," Cadance admitted. "Not Griffonstone, though. Griffons are very nice people, but the city isn't the best for tourism."

"I want them to follow your orders because they'll have to get used to it, at some point," Celestia said. "Either you'll be a Duchess and you'll outrank most of them, or..." She trailed off. "I won't make promises I can't be sure I can keep, but there has always been a destiny I've wanted for you."

Sunset swallowed. "You mean-"

"You know exactly what I mean," Celestia said. "I was afraid you were turning down the wrong path for a time, but now?" She shrugged. "You've grown a lot in the last year, Sunset. You're not quite the angry filly you used to be."

"Tell that to Blueblood," Sunset said, weakly.

"I would have been more concerned if you hadn't reacted the way you did," Celestia said, leaning in so she could speak more candidly. "And you caused less property damage than I expected."

"What a glowing compliment that I didn't break as much as physically possible," Sunset muttered.

"If you hadn't done something, I would have." Celestia gave her a very serious look. "Attacking an innocent foal like that was inexcusable. You know Midnight is like a granddaughter to me."

"He's going to complain a lot, you know," Sunset said. "And he's going to try and cause trouble later."

"True," Celestia agreed. "But he'll try to cause trouble for you, and I'm sure you can take care of yourself. If I might make a suggestion, though?"

"Hm?" Sunset tilted her head.

"Consider this good practice at defending yourself politically. Take it as a challenge to deal with Blueblood without resorting to physical force or magical intimidation. Not that what you did tonight was wrong - a show of force is sometimes required to put a pony like that in his place."

"I wouldn't even know where to start," Sunset frowned.

"The best way is simply to talk to ponies," Celestia smiled. "There may be some bad apples among the nobility, but there are good ones, too. Make friends in both groups, and you can lend aid to those who are opposing him."

"That's a lot of work," Sunset frowned.

"It's also slow, and requires you to rely on other ponies," Celestia agreed. "It's not nearly as fast or as viscerally satisfying as, say, setting his tail on fire. But with the right application of force, it's also crippling beyond measure. A noble is nothing if ponies won't follow them."

"Isn't the same true for me, though?" Sunset said. "There aren't a lot of ponies who care about what I think."

"You'd be surprised. They know you have my ear, and you don't currently have any real political friends or foes. As word gets around, they'll be trying to insinuate themselves with you in hopes that you'll become their ally."

"But-"

"Don't think that just because they'd be trying to get to me through you that it means you're less important," Celestia said. "Especially if you take up my offer to run the Court. You'd become the most important pony in Equestria in a heartbeat."

"I... guess I could try." Sunset frowned.

"I wouldn't just drop it in your lap," Celestia said, quickly. "You could spend a few weeks or months or however long you feel comfortable with it learning from me. You could sit in at court and watch, then when you were ready you could start making decisions on your own, and eventually I wouldn't need to be there at all unless you were unavailable." She gave Sunset a hopeful smile.

"Are you just suggesting this because you hate running the court yourself?" Sunset asked, suddenly sensing the real reason behind it.

"Sunset, that is a very harsh accusation. I would never be so underhooved." Celestia scoffed. "I mean, yes, I'd have more free time, since I currently have none at all, but that's hardly an ulterior motive."

"I knew it," Sunset smiled a little. "Next you'll have me raise the sun so you can sleep in."

"Only on Mondays," Celestia said, very seriously. After a moment her composure broke and she started laughing. Sunset joined her. "I'd also like to spend some of that free time with you. Assuming my niece isn't taking it up."

"I'm not sure what you mean," Cadance said, looking to the side.

"You know, I should have spoken to you both as soon as I became aware of this." Celestia coughed and raised her nose. "Sunset Shimmer, what are your intentions in dating my niece?"

"Oh no," Cadance whispered.

"Dating?" Sunset blinked.

"Don't play innocent with me," Celestia said. "I know you've been spending time with her and doing things in private."

"Well-" Sunset wasn't sure how to respond to that. "We're just friends!"

"We've only been dating for like two weeks!" Cadance said. Then she immediately put her hooves over her mouth.

"Am I going to have to call Cadance 'Mom' too?" Midnight asked. "I mean, not like... Mom-2. Like will I also have to call her Mom? Or maybe just Pink Mom?"

"Don't you start!" Sunset groaned.

"I just don't want my niece to end up with a filly before she's ready... hm." Celestia frowned. "Maybe it's too late for that."

"Celestia, I am a hundred percent sure that whatever we did, which we will not repeat in front of a filly, could not have gotten me pregnant," Cadance said. "Besides, I'm still trying to get Sunset used to the idea of initiating it herself."

"I should have seen the signs!" Celestia sighed. "Such a cute filly, and Cadance even helped raise her!" She picked Midnight up and nuzzled her. "Just don't let your Pink Mom avoid paying foal support."

"Oh Harmony," Sunset groaned. "Are you trying to kill me? Because you're killing me."

"I suppose I can stop teasing you," Celestia said, after considering it for a moment. "But only because I still want to be able to take a day off once in a while."

"I'm sure that's the only reason," Cadance rolled her eyes.

"Let's get this little one to bed," Celestia said. "Sunset, why don't you sleep on the idea, and... we could discuss it over breakfast?" She sounded hopeful.

Sunset nodded.

"I'll see you then," Celestia said, smiling. "Thank you."

Chapter 15

"Hear ye, hear ye, the Solar Court is now in session," yelled the crier. Sunset sighed and, still less than comfortable with this, stepped out into the throne room. Celestia had advised her to wear something she'd feel comfortable in for a few hours, and she'd settled on a simple collar and a few pieces of jewelry. Less than what Celestia usually wore to the court, but she didn't feel right just copying her mentor.

And if she'd worn a giant crown it might have sent the wrong message.

"Presiding over the court, the honorable Duchess Sunset Shimmer," the crier continued. There were a few murmurs from the gathering crowd, but they'd known she was going to be taking over herself well in advance, and it was really only news to a few.

"Good morning, everypony," Sunset said, feigning a smile. "So, who do we have today as the first case?" She settled down on the throne, the size of the thing making her feel like a foal. She made a mental note to bring a pillow. Or maybe a different chair. She could practically fit another throne (sized for a normal pony) just in Princess Celestia's seat.

"Mister Crouton and Miss Caesar against the Crouton and Caesar families regarding a marriage proposal," said the court aide, Raven, as she gave Sunset a scroll with a summary of the issue.

"Please come forward," Sunset said, as she glanced over the scroll. "I've got the paperwork here, but I'd like to hear it in your own words."

Two very young ponies, only a little older than Midnight and Twilight, approached the throne to one side, and older ponies, clearly their parents, approached on the other side, occasionally glaring at each other.

"Your Highness-" the young stallion started.

"Just Ma'am, or Sunset," Sunset said. "I'm not a Princess."

"Well, Ma'am," the stallion corrected. "My marefriend and I want to get married, but our parents won't allow it, and we're not old enough to get married without their permission."

"You're fifteen!" The older stallion who looked like Crouton’s father yelled. "You are far too young to make decisions like that!"

"We're in love, Dad!" Crouton said. "What's so bad about wanting to share the rest of our lives together? Just because you broke up with your high-school sweetheart-"

Sunset coughed loudly. "No yelling, please. We're here to solve arguments, not just act as a host for them."

"I apologize, Ma'am," the elder Crouton said. "But this whole thing is nonsense. The law says he can't get married without our permission, and if there's anything I can agree on with his marefriend's parents, it's that neither of them is ready."

"Our daughter can't possibly understand. She's simply not old enough," the mare whom Sunset had to assume was Caesar's mother put in. "I want her to be happy, and she's too young to know what that really means."

Sunset rubbed her chin, thinking. "You do have legal precedent and both the intent and word of the law on your side." She looked at Crouton and Caesar. "The reason those laws exist is to prevent young ponies from making decisions that can affect their lives before they have enough experience to understand the consequences."

Thankfully she wasn't struck down instantly by the forces of irony just for saying that out loud.

"But the law can be bypassed if you allow it," Crouton said. "We're in love, and it's not going to just go away. But our parents won't let us be together - they're going to make us break up because they think we're going too fast! If we don't get married, we can't be together at all."

Sunset tapped her hoof against the throne. What would Celestia do? She wouldn't overturn the law and set precedent unless it was needed. But she'd want to find a way to make everypony happy with a compromise.

"I think," Sunset said, at length. "We can find a way to resolve this that takes everypony's concerns into consideration."
"You mean we can get married?" Crouton asked, smiling.

"Yes. In three years," Sunset said. "At that point you'll be of age and can get married no matter what your parents think."

"But we can't wait that long! If we have to spend three years apart-"

"And in the meantime," Sunset continued. "Your parents will sign a contract that prevents them from forbidding you from seeing her. If you stay together for three years, then they will allow you to get married. I'm sure we can even work an incentive in there. Perhaps free use of one of the ballrooms for the wedding and reception?"

"That'll never work!" the elder Caesar yelled. "I'm not going to sign anything that lets him corrupt my daughter and probably get her with foal just because they think they're in love!"

"Corrupt your daughter?!" The elder Crouton screamed. "It's my son that your temptress has enslaved!'

Sunset groaned as they descended into screaming at each other.

"It could have gone better," Sunset sighed. "In the end they refused to take any compromise that they weren't happy with. Maybe if Celestia had suggested it, they'd have just bowed and scraped at her wisdom, but I'm not good enough, apparently." She collapsed into a chair in the sitting room.

"It's possible you didn't make the compromise even enough," Twilight Sparkle said, from where she was studying. "Did you do the math?"

"What math?" Sunset asked.

"Celestia recommended some books on philosophy to me after I said that all soft sciences were junk," Twilight said. "And there was one about how morality could be reduced to a math equation. You just look at how much each side values certain outcomes and determine the greatest good from their valuation of each potential scenario."

"That seems like a lot of work," Sunset muttered.

"But if done accurately, you can ensure the best result," Twilight said. She picked up a few books and levitated them over to Sunset. "Here. This has the basics, but it's really just a simple optimization problem."

"Huh..." Sunset started reading. It was tempting to be able to fall back on math instead of having to try and negotiate a compromise...

"Now hearing the case of Cherry Jubilee against Sundae Best," the Crier called out.

Sunset looked at the blackboard behind her. She'd had it brought in this morning so she could do the math openly instead of making ponies wait while she worked on an abacus. Showing your work was important, after all.

"Good morning, your worshipfulness," Cherry Jubilee said, fluttering her eyelashes. "Thank you ever so much for hearing this case. I do apologize for how this escalated until you had to hear about it."

"Not sorry enough to handle this like an adult," Sundae Best muttered, the white, dappled mare tossing her chocolate-brown mane back as she adjusted her red beret.

"So this is an issue about... the price of cherry preserves?" Sunset asked, as she skimmed over the notes. That seemed like a good test for the mathematical model of handling the court. Prices were a number, after all, and math really preferred working with numbers.

"That's correct," Cherry Jubilee said. "You see, it's a bit of a complicated situation."

"I can handle complicated," Sunset said.

"Alright, sugar, but don't say I didn't warn you."

"...And because of that, the agricultural futures market is a very risky business, and relies on things going according to plan. If you buy low and there's a shortage, you come out ahead, but if you buy high and the season is better than expected, you still have to buy at that high price."

"Okay," Sunset said, slowly.

"And the preserves," Cherry Jubilee said. "Are from last year's stock, but you have to take into account the cost of replacement rather than the cost at the time of making them..."

"...So because of the rain shortage in Cloudsdale on account of Hollow Shades being unable to produce a waterspout, the harvest predictions fell low by almost thirty percent, which was compounded by the loss of workers from the rush to Appleoosa and the increased property taxes that were used to modernize the train tracks..."

"...And all in all, it's just impossible for me to sell cherry preserves at ten bits a jar. I'd have to spend twenty just to keep the farm from closing!" Cherry Jubilee wiped a tear from the corner of her eye.

"Okay, well, that's great and all, but here's my counter-argument," Sundae Best said. "We have a contract for ten, and you can take your sob story and push it right up your-"

Sunset coughed loudly.

"Okay, well, that's quite a story," Sunset said. "But you do, from what I understand, have a contract."

"That's correct," Cherry Jubilee said. "And there's an escape clause in case I am unable to meet the requirements. I would pay Miss Sundae Best a sum of seven hundred bits as a flat sum and then I would be released from the contract in perpetuity."

"The escape clause is only allowed when you can't provide the goods, not just because you don't want to!" Sundae best snapped. "You've got the cherries!"

"But I can't provide them at that price!" Cherry Jubilee frowned.

"Wait, wait," Sunset said, raising her hooves. "How many jars of preserves are we talking about?"

"A hundred," Cherry Jubilee said.

"So we're arguing all this over..." Sunset did the math in her head. "Three hundred bits."

"Three hundred bits, assuming she accepts the offer and buys her normal stock," Cherry Jubilee said, nodding. "It seems like such a small matter, doesn't it?"

"It's not three hundred bits," Sundae Best countered. "It starts there, but then every year after that it's more, and without a contract you can just keep raising the price."

"If you can get jars of cherry preserves of the same quality for less than twenty a jar, I would surely like to know where," Cherry Jubilee said. "Why the last three years we've been running at a loss selling to you!"

"Okay!" Sunset yelled. "Great! Now, let's see what we can do to solve this and come to a reasonable compromise." She stepped up to the blackboard. "If you have an abacus, feel free to follow along. We'll start with the current price of cherry preserves here..."

Hours later, Sunset was still working on the equation. "And if we average out the typical loan payment from the Royal Bank to keep the farm afloat, we can see that the actual fair market price of the cherry preserves is..." She frowned. "Seven hundred bits per jar? I did something wrong. Let's start over at the top."

The court filled with groans.

"And this time we come to a final conclusive result of fifteen bits per jar," Sunset said, happily. "A little more than the average the first year considering the seven-hundred bit payout, but it should be fair and the new contract can adjust for inflation dynamically..." She turned around when she heard a snore. She was the only pony still awake.

"Wonderful," She groaned.

"Well, first, I don't think that's what Twilight meant by using math to determine a case," Midnight said. "I'm pretty sure the books she was reading actually mentioned math as an abstract type of thing since it's impossible to really, objectively tell how much something matters."

"I know that now, yeah," Sunset sighed.

"Look, Mom, you're a smart pony," Midnight said. "Otherwise Celestia wouldn't have made you her regent. Basically her regent. What you should do is just go with your gut."

"My gut?" Sunset asked.

"Sure. I mean, you've got a killer instinct!" Midnight grinned. "You can handle yourself without needing to do all that boring math. Just do what feels right and things take care of themselves. What are they going to do, say no? You're the highest court to appeal to!"

"Maybe you're right," Sunset said.

"Yeah!" Midnight grinned. "And then you could see more than one case in a day."

Sunset threw a pillow at her.

"Now hearing the case of Heaven Cent against the Royal Revenue Service," the crier yelled. Sunset's eyebrow rose up.

"Before we even begin, am I to understand that the RRS is actually the defendant in this hearing?" Sunset asked. "Because usually they're the ones throwing charges at ponies for evading taxes. And they're usually right."

"Not in this case!" Heaven Cent said. He was a golden - literally golden, since he apparently washed his coat with glitter - stallion with a pure white mane and... yes, Sunset could see literal golden teeth in his mouth. "I am suing them for defamation."

"For defamation," Sunset said, flatly. "Okay. Let's hear it. And keep it brief." She heard some sighs of relief from the court.

"It's simple, Ma'am," Heaven Cent said, starting to pace back and forth. "You see, the RRS has declared that my investment firm has been unfaithful to its investors. Worse than that, they're saying we're a sort of pyramid scheme! That kind of bad press can ruin a pony."

"Is it a pyramid scheme?" Sunset asked. She motioned for Raven to give her the relevant scroll. "According to this you used the investments from lower-ranking partners to pay off the ones above them. Isn't that literally the definition?"

"Of course not," Heaven Cent scoffed. "It's no different than preferred stocks and regular stocks-"

"I'm not as stupid as your investors, Mister Cent," Sunset interrupted. "What is the actual investment plan, if there is one?"

"Exclusive access to stocks that aren't being publically traded yet," Heaven Cent said. "I use the money from the investors to fund startup companies in exchange for partial ownership, then once they go public, the stocks are sold back to the company at a profit and the returns go to the investors in preferred stock order."

"How much of that is legal?" Sunset asked, looking past Heaven Cent to the RRS representative standing off to the side. She knew it was an RRS representative because they all looked identical, and Sunset was halfway sure they only came with numbers instead of names.

"In theory, it's legal," the RRS accountant noted. "However, as they say, Discord is in the details. The issue is that he's attracting investors with unrealistic profit returns from the few successes, and not disclosing to them the number of these startup companies that fail. According to our findings, he uses the money and contracts from later investors to pay off the ones where the endeavor in question has failed."

"Great," Sunset said. "I find in favor of the Royal Revenue Service. Next case."

"What?!" Heaven Cent gasped. "You aren't even going to let me defend myself?!"

"I'm doing you a favor," Sunset said. "You won't win against the RRS. No pony wins against the RRS. At the dark end of the universe, when the stars have faded and the sun has gone out, they'll still be filing forms."

"I will file an official complaint with the Princess!" Heaven Cent yelled, as he stormed out. "And I'll go to the press!"

"So now they're saying I'm just ruling arbitrary," Sunset complained, as she stabbed her fork into some broccoli, dragging it through the hollandaise sauce before eating it, the food almost good enough to remove the frown from her lips. Almost.

"Sunset, if you're just going on instinct, you basically are," Cadance said, bumping her flank against Sunset's. They were eating in front of the fireplace, alone. They'd had to retreat away from the public areas of the castle just to get away from the reporters trying to get Sunset to admit she hated freedom and the economy. "And you should have known ponies would be unhappy."

"What, because I protected them against a jerk?" Sunset frowned.

"Because a lot of very important and rich ponies are jerks just like that one was," Cadance corrected. "And you've set precedent in court that you'll rule on what feels right instead of the letter of the law. A lot of ponies do things that are very wrong, ethically, but are still technically legal."

"Last time I held court, basically none of the nobles showed up," Sunset frowned.

"You just need to regain their trust," Cadance suggested. "You know, Celestia almost never just says no herself. That's one reason ponies like her. She just listens to everypony, and she offers suggestions instead of giving orders, and most importantly, she never says no. She says 'I need to do research on this' or 'I'll send this to committee' or 'I need to have my cabinet look at this' and the problem goes away."

"So I should just defer things?" Sunset asked.

"More that you shouldn't make any negative decisions. Requests get turned down by committees that stay totally faceless and can't be blamed on the Princess at all. When ponies think you agree with them, they like you more. Like how I don't argue with you about the way you use all my conditioner, and I just compliment you on the way your mane looks."

"But you do like the way my mane looks," Sunset said. She paused. "Right?"

"It's a very interesting proposal," Sunset agreed. She looked at the reams of paper in front of her. There were a hundred pages and the smiling stallion who'd presented it had decided that it could be summarized in only a few paragraphs.

"I'm glad you agree," Filthy Rich said. "The current tax laws made sense back when there was a huge divide between the nobility and the common pony, but now we've got a strong middle class, and we need to gradiate the tax spectrum further in order to take care of it. For the average pony, especially those who own their own homes, this should lessen their overall tax burden while still providing the same tax revenue to the crown."

"I'm not saying I agree or disagree," Sunset said. "I said it was an interesting proposal. It's also very detailed."

"It has to be, to cover all edge cases," Filthy Rich said. "For example, ponies who rent, those with lower income who shouldn't be taken advantage of, and small business owners."

"And you would come under that last category," Sunset said.

"Actually, all three," Filthy Rich noted. "Barnyard Bargains owns my home, and I rent it back to them in a rent-to-own schema, and the actual net income of the business is marginal - which we pride ourselves on because it means more value to our customers."

"...I see," Sunset said. "Given the extensive length of these documents, I'd have to get an analysis from an expert-"

"I have one right here, just in case you needed one," Filthy Rich said, putting a folder on top of the legal document. "From my very own accountant."

"Well, even so, we'll need an independent study. The crown maintains experts just for this kind of case and it would be..." Sunset fought to find the right word. "Against policy to not utilize their skills."

Policy was good. You could get away with a lot if it had to do with policy.

"I thought you might say that," Filthy Rich said. "Which is why I have these documents from those very experts..."

"Never again," Sunset groaned, slamming the doors closed so she could get some quiet. After word had gotten out that she was taking any and all proposals seriously, dozens of ponies had shown up out of the woodwork with harmless-sounding suggestions.

Raising the tariff on griffon-made pottery to increase domestic demand. Using Crown funding to get the levees in Neigh Orleans improved (despite the city refusing to spend its own tax dollars on the project). A proposal for free textbooks to be given to children, which Sunset had almost signed until she realized the law required the textbooks to be purchased from a single publishing company and didn't restrict them from raising the cost as much as they wanted.

Sunset collapsed into bed and stared at the ceiling and the shadows racing across it, the setting sun and the trees outside her window casting long, spidery shadows.

"I let them walk all over me, just like Cadance wanted me to," Sunset said, to herself. "And they sure like me, just like they'd like a nice soft mat to cushion their hooves."

Sunset took a deep breath, looking at the shadows.

"Maybe that's why Celestia has me running the court instead of Cadance. She'd just be too nice to ponies. She'd have the country in ruins in a week and they'd fight over who deserves a bigger portion of the ashes. I should just put my hoof down and let them know who's in charge. That's the ticket."

"Did you hear me?" Book Binder said. "I said it was only a verbal contract. Since he didn't actually get anything in writing, we don't owe him a thing for his work, nor do we intend to publish it. Of course, anything sent into the publishing house becomes our property, as he would have noted if he read the legal disclaimer-"

"Be quiet," Sunset said.

"You don't understand," Book Binder continued. "I am just-"

"SILENCE!" Sunset yelled. Book Binder was forced to his knees as the gravity around him abruptly doubled. "I am done listening to this pathetic excuse! You know what my days have been? Listening to useless argument after useless argument! You are all like helpless children and clearly you need discipline!"

"Uh-" Falling Apple, who had been Book Binder's opponent, looked down at his legal foe with concern, then up at Sunset. After a moment, he bowed as well, though out of concern for his own health instead of a sudden increase in gravity (or gravitas).

"You cannot remove a pony's rights to the fruit of their own labor without offering anything in recompense. You are holding his story hostage so you can sue him if he takes it to your rivals at Parasprite Press, aren't you?!" Sunset demanded.

"We- that is-"

"I don't need to hear excuses. Your legal disclaimer is null and void. You do not own works you have not purchased. As you have already confessed in front of this court, you do not even intend to consider purchasing them! I order you to immediately notify every pony whose works are being held hostage in this way that you no longer have a claim to their works, pay a fine for those whose works have been in your possession for more than thirty days without being published, and issue a public apology."

"Thank you, Ma'am!" Falling Apple said. "Please don't smite us!"

"I'll take that under advisement. Next case."

Sunset looked at the papers.

"It's a very tasteful woodcut," Cadance said. "It really captures your essence."

"It shows me sitting on a throne of skulls," Sunset said. "And the article is even worse. It claims I'm going insane with power."

"Do you feel insane?" Midnight asked. She leaned over to Princess Cadance. "Does she seem insane to you? You can use your alicorn magic to check that."

"I'm not insane," Sunset growled. "But I've got an awful headache."

"Maybe you should take a day off," Cadance suggested. "Celestia would understand-"

"What, that I couldn't even make it a week?" Sunset frowned. "No, I can do this. I'll get through the day. It's just a headache."

"Just promise me you won't go insane, Mom," Midnight said. "I don't want Pink Mom to have to banish you to the... where would you banish her to?"

"Love dungeon," Cadance said, firmly.

"Cadance, I have a headache," Sunset groaned.

"Mares always make that excuse," Cadance sighed.

"Okay, no," Sunset sighed, picking the horn from the crier's grasp and just vanishing it into a vector trap. "No loud noises. And somepony close the curtains. I've got a killer headache. Let's just try and get through this."

"Um, yes, Ma'am," Raven said, quietly. "The first case is one Mister Pear Necessities versus Banana Fofana ShimSham Wobana Banana."

"Did I just have a stroke?" Sunset asked.

"No, that really is her name, Ma'am," Raven said, seriously.

"Send them in. Quietly."

Sunset poured herself coffee while she waited for them to, cautiously, approach the throne. They were probably afraid of being thrown into the dungeon. Sunset wasn't sure she had enough energy to order lunch, much less order a pony to be imprisoned.

"What is it?" Sunset asked, leaning back with her eyes closed.

"Please don't smite us," Banana said, simply.

"Granted. Next case."

"Ma'am," Raven warned.

Sunset groaned. "Fine, what is it?"

"Well, not to trouble your eternal fiery lady of darkness or whatever particular epithet you'd like us to worship you under," Pear Necessities started. "But we have a field that we share, and we don't have a formal agreement as to how to share it and-"

"Cut it in half down the middle," Sunset sighed. "Have someone go out and survey the property lines."

"Um, alright," Pear Necessities said, surprised.

"If you want to argue about the value of the field or who owns the crops or whatever, don't," Sunset said. "The surveyor will be impartial and official, and you own whatever is on your side. If you want to change things after that, settle it like adults. Next case."

"Thank you, Ma'am," Banana said, backing up right out of the room.

"That went well," Raven said, pleased. "I was afraid they would argue more about it. The local authorities suggested the same solution."

"Yeah, well, you know how it is." Sunset yawned. "Next case."

"Ma'am?" Raven asked, poking Sunset. "Are you awake?"

"Cut it in half!" Sunset said loudly, sitting up. "I wasn't asleep!"

"Cut it in half?!" A stallion gasped. A mare fainted.

"Ma'am," Raven whispered. "This is a foal custody case."

"Oh horseapples," Sunset sighed.

"Nopony actually got cut in half," Sunset pointed out. Twilight frowned and looked at Midnight.

"Was it your idea?" She asked.

"No, Mom was just feeling sick, and I guess when she's sick she just defaults to good old Queen Hoofrod." Midnight shrugged. "I mean, it almost worked. Except for the cutting a foal in half thing. I'm sure the royal guard wouldn't have actually done it."

"Don't be too sure," Sunset muttered. "They're not that bright."

"My brother is in the Royal Guard," Twilight said.

"Yeah, well," Sunset shrugged. "Maybe he's officer material. At least this is the last day. After this I won't have to deal with it for a while and Celestia can owe me big time for letting her have a week off."

"So what are you going to do today?" Midnight asked. "Tell everypony to save it for next week?"

"As tempting as it is, I know Celestia would tell me I had to listen to their cases at that point because I hadn't really run the court like I said I would," Sunset tapped a hoof in thought. "I don't know. I've tried being nice. I've tried being a tyrant. I've tried compromise. I've tried figuring it out objectively with math..."

Sunset looked at High Class. She looked back at Sunset. Sunset sighed and looked out the window.

"So you want to change Canterlot's zoning regulations so you can build a tower on your property," Sunset said.

"Specifically the regulation about towers being higher than the castle wall, yes," High Class nodded. "I understand it was important in times of war, when the castle wall needed to be able to draw line of sight to any part of the city, but times have changed."

"Well, times have changed," Sunset agreed. She shook her head and stepped down from the throne, facing High Class eye-to-eye. "Look, let's be honest about this. The only reason you want to build a tower is because you want your house to be bigger than the one next door."

"There's no crime against that," High Class said.

"There is, actually," Sunset said. "The zoning laws. The ones you want changed. Honestly, if you had a decent reason for it, I'd be tempted, but no matter how much you claim it's a home observatory or solarium or whatever, it's still just another tool in your little tower measuring contest and you're trying to drag the crown into it because you're feeling impotent."

"It's not-"

Sunset held up a hoof.

"I know." Sunset smiled. "I know what it's like when you have to live your whole life compared to other ponies. It's awful, especially when you come up short and it's not your fault. Look, between you and me and the court, you don't need the tower. You're just out of ideas if it's gotten to this point. Let's come up with something else, right? Something where you won't need to worry about changing the zoning laws."

"...But I already tried everything else," High Class hissed. "I need this!"

"You tried everything you thought of," Sunset agreed. "That's why I'm going to help you think of something new." She put a hoof around High Class's shoulders.

"You're going to help me like that?"

"I'm not Princess Celestia's stand-in just because I have a sun on my flank," Sunset smiled. "And let me tell you a secret - it's a lot easier for me to help you come up with an idea that won't require changing zoning laws. Besides, you'd feel stupid in a month if your rival built an even bigger tower and you were stuck with one you didn't really want."

"I guess," High Class agreed.

"So, how do you feel about illusion spells?"

"You know, I was afraid it was going to go poorly there, for a while," Celestia said. She sipped at her tea for a moment, then blew on the steaming liquid.

"You raise the sun and your tea is too hot to drink without blowing on it?" Sunset asked, smirking.

"Tea is very delicate," Celestia said. "Too hot and it burns. Too cold and it doesn't brew properly. Steep it too long and it's bitter. Don't steep it long enough and it's weak and tasteless." She looked at her cup. "It's a lot like our little ponies, isn't it? And every variety is different. Every harvest has its own quirks."

"I've always preferred coffee," Sunset admitted.

"That's good," Celestia said. "You should have your own tastes. If you and I did things the same way, we'd be judged against each other."

"I have no idea how you manage to run this country," Sunset blurted out. "At least without all of them hating you."

"Tradition, mostly," Celestia said. "They listen to me because I'm old and respected and that respect came entirely with time. My first castle - the first one I had built, I mean - was full of practical jokes and traps and..." She looked wistfully out the window. Sunset followed her gaze. There was nothing there except the moon. "Well, it couldn't last forever. Eventually I had to grow up."

"Are you okay?" Sunset asked, surprised by Celestia's tone.

"Of course, Sunset." Celetia sipped at her tea. "Just thinking of better times." She stopped and smiled across the table. "Well, perhaps not better, but full of nostalgia. I wouldn't give up what I have now for the world."

Sunset blushed slightly. "Sorry about you having to clean up my messes."

"There's little to clean up. In the end you had the right idea. Making friends of the ponies that come to you. It's the best way to really help them, and to connect with them. I'm proud of you, even if it did take a few tries to get it right." She smiled. "Ah, the tea is the perfect temperature."

"Can I try some?" Sunset asked.

"You only ever have to ask."

Chapter 16

Cadance flipped through the magazine while Midnight talked, only half-listening. She paused at an ad for a new perfume. It promised to get the wearer the kind of attention a Princess deserved, and the model was a passable copy of Cadance herself, though without a horn.

"I hope my flank doesn't look that big," Cadance muttered. She looked back to her cutie mark. It didn't look as round from this angle.

"So what should I do?" Midnight asked, finally. Cadance winced and wished she'd been listening to what Midnight had been talking about. Midnight and Sunset could both talk for hours about problems that were either so simple they just needed to stop worrying and do what they already planned to do, or complex and impossible to understand unless you were a scholar of some obscure part of magical trivia. And there was often no way to know which until after you'd already agreed to help and then somepony drags out a blackboard and math and you're doomed.

"I think," Cadance said, carefully. "You should talk to your mom, and spend some time considering all the options before you make a decision on anything important."

"You weren't listening," Midnight said, flatly.

"Does my flank really look this big?" Cadance asked, turning the magazine around.

"No, but big flanks are the 'in' thing this season, according to the cover," Midnight noted.

"Feathers!" Cadance muttered. "I lose either way."

"And don't change the subject. I just want to know what you did to get through puberty," Midnight groaned. "This is awful! I'm sore every morning, boys keep looking at me like I've got something on my face, and my fetlocks are growing so quickly I have to trim them every day!"

"Your mother is having growth spurts too," Cadance noted. "I suppose she was a little short for a unicorn."

"I tried asking her for help and she said she just drank a lot of strong herbal tea and never left her room."

"Midnight, when I went through puberty it included growing a new body part and having to figure out how to use magic," Cadance smiled. "Trust me, my advice is even less useful than anything Sunset would tell you."

"That's what I was afraid of," Midnight sighed. "I guess that means my best bet is to use my backup plan."

"If you're going to ask Celestia, I doubt she even remembers what puberty was like," Cadance pointed out. "I can't imagine her as a little filly. She's just so big and white and big!"

"She is big and white," Midnight agreed. "But my backup plan is sort of a workaround to the whole issue. Puberty only lasts a few years, so all I really have to do is wait for it to end."

"That's a very mature way to look at things," Cadance smiled.

"Right. So then you agree that using an age spell is the next logical step," Midnight nodded. "I can just skip ahead five years or so and problem solved."

"Midnight-"

"No, no, I know what you're going to say." Midnight held up a hood. "That should logically also reduce my expected future lifespan. However, what I can do is wait a further five years, then just use a second age spell to put me back to my 'proper' age. It will make birthday parties a little awkward for a while, but it's basically foalproof."

"Midnight..."

"Get it? Foalproof? It's a joke about age spells."

"Midnight, puberty isn't some scary thing that you have to run away from or avoid," Cadance smiled. "You know, someday you're going to look back on when you were this age and you're going to wonder what you were ever worried about."

Midnight frowned. "Cadance, you went to Canterlot High. I want you to tell me that being a teenager and having to deal with all of that wasn't absolutely the worst thing that has ever happened to you."

"Actually, the worst thing that ever happened to me was this one time I was sitting on the stairs in the east gallery and I put my head through the posts so I could get a better look at something through the railing. I got stuck for hours!" Cadance rubbed her neck. "Most of the guards were too afraid to touch a princess and Celestia was away helping with aid to Burrexico."

"..." Midnight tilted her head. "And that was the worst thing?"

"I had to go to the bathroom the whole time! Eventually one of the maids found a bucket of grease and managed to get me free. Learn from my mistakes, Midnight. Never stick anything in a place that's too small for it, and carry plenty of lubrication just in case."

"You know, I am old enough to know you're teasing me when you say that," Midnight said, flatly.

"Teasing you?" Cadance asked, innocently.

"Cadance, come on," Midnight groaned. "All I'm asking for is a little official royal support to check out a few books from the black section of the restricted wing."

"I don't know enough about magic to give you permission for something like that," Cadance said. "But I do know it sounds dangerous. Books in that section are restricted for a reason."

"They're only dangerous to ponies that don't know what they're doing," Midnight shrugged. "Princess Celestia says I'm one of the smartest ponies she's ever met. Plus if I can get this to work I'll be able to skip puberty while Twilight suffers and I'll be the oldest!" She laughed. Lightning should have crashed down dramatically, if there was any sense of drama. Cadance looked past Midnight to the window. It was a bright, sunshiny day.

"Midnight, you can't just skip through the parts of your life you don't want to deal with," Cadance said. She stood up and walked over to Midnight, walking with her out to the balcony. "Puberty isn't just about physical growth, it's the time in your life when you're learning the most, especially about yourself. You need to go through it, or else it's like skipping classes in school and thinking you'll still be ready to graduate at the end. Do you get what I mean?"

"I guess," Midnight sighed. "But I still won't enjoy it."

"You might be surprised." Cadance smiled. "I mean, just think - soon you'll be getting interested in boys, and dating, and then I can start giving you some tips!"

"Cadance, no," Midnight said, backing away. "Please no. I'm still scarred after you tried to give me the 'sex talk'."

"It was better that you learned what all those terms really meant," Cadance said. "I mean, when I was your age, I thought horn-jobs were a real thing! I mean, technically they are, but they're just sort of stupid foreplay since there's really no feeling along the surface of your horn-"

"I'm not listening!" Midnight yelled, blocking her ears and closing her eyes.

"And let me tell you, it's worse when you're an alicorn," Cadance continued. "I thought I was going to have to deal with normal problems, but no, I had to find out that being the alicorn of love and going through puberty meant that everypony around me found me irresistible-"

Cadance's words cut off as the world plunged into silence. She looked back at Midnight. The unicorn's horn was glowing, and she stuck her tongue out at Cadance.

When Cadance tried to continue with hoof motions, Midnight lost her composure and fled the room, her cheeks as bright red as a candy apple.

"You shouldn't do that to her," Sunset said, later, as she walked with Cadance back to their room after a very long day of dealing with the nobility and not being allowed to set anything on fire. "She'll start to think that you're normal. I don't want her growing up to be a pervert like you."

"Celestia is worse," Cadance said. "She just hides it better. I caught her giving the ambassador from Saddle Arabia the look."

"The look?" Sunset asked.

"You know," Cadance said. "The look." She wiggled her eyebrows and gave Sunset a sultry smile.

"She does not give anypony that look," Sunset said. "That's your look when you want to fluster somepony."

"When I want to fluster you," Cadance corrected.

They felt magic wash over them, and their steps slowed. Sunset looked confused for a moment, then groaned.

"You know, maybe I should have learned that saying no to a filly when I'm the one who raised them just means they'll do exactly what I did when I was her age," Sunset said.

"We've got to stop her before she turns herself into an old lady!" Cadance gasped.

"Even I don't mess with age spells!" Sunset huffed, breaking into a run as she made for her quarters. She wasn't going to risk teleporting in and disrupting what felt like very unstable magic. She reached the door and knocked. "Midnight, open up!"

"In a minute!" Midnight yelled from inside.

"I'm coming in!" Sunset said, the lock springing open for a moment before a pink aura secured it again. "Hey!"

"Just a minute!" Midnight repeated.

"You listen here, young lady, I am coming in right now and you are not going to be allowed near any banned spellbooks for a week!" Sunset tried unlocking it again and, frustrated, blasted the lock right out of the door.

"Mom!" Midnight gasped, as Sunset stormed in. A magical array hung over her head, half of the runes flickering in and out of sight. "I'm in the middle of something!"

"I'm pretty sure you didn't get permission for this," Sunset said. She glanced up at the spell, then back to Midnight. "Cancel the spell before somepony gets hurt. It's already falling apart at the edges."

"No! I can handle this!" Midnight said. "Watch!" She mumbled something, running her hoof down the page in the ancient book in front of her, and the array shone with a bright white light for a moment before turning a sickly purple-green.

"That's not good," Cadance said. The color shifted to something that wasn't really a color at all, and hurt her eyes to look at. "That's worse!"

"Okay, that's it," Sunset said. "I'm putting an end to this." She started casting a disrupting spell, and the array hanging in the air came apart for all of a half second before part of it collapsed into the remaining runes, and a bolt of energy followed the path Sunset had unintentionally created from the spell to herself.

There was a flash as the spell discharged. Cadance covered her eyes, and when the light had faded, Sunset was gone.

"S-Sunset?" Cadance asked. "Sunset?! Where did you go?!" She started looking around. Had she teleported away? A small noise, like a gurgling coo, caught her attention, and Cadance looked down.

An infant filly with a red and yellow mane looked up at her, confused and burbling.

Cadance looked at Midnight, who smiled sheepishly. "I-it's not my fault?" Midnight suggested.

"She's banned from the library for a month," Celestia said, as she sat with Cadance in her quarters. "Midnight should have known better than to try spells that were very specifically marked as too dangerous for anypony to use."

"At least Sunset makes for a cute little foal," Cadance said, poking the filly's nose. Sunset gurgled and tried to grab her hoof.

"I can't think of anypony better to care for her until I've sorted this out," Celestia smiled. "I'm sure it shouldn't be more than a few days. I have the book Midnight used to try and cast the spell." She picked up the black tome, flipping through it for a moment. "I'm not terribly familiar with how age spells work, and I don't want to do anything that would hurt Sunset, so perhaps a week at most. I'm canceling all my non-essential meetings until this is resolved."

"Thank you, Auntie," Cadance said. "I'm sure Sunset would thank you too, if she could talk. Or had real motor control."

"Remember you can ask for anything," Celestia said, standing up. "I'm not really sure what Sunset was like at that age, but she seems like a good filly. Just try to keep her out of trouble."

"How hard could that be?" Cadance smiled. "I'm an expert at foalsitting, and she's too young to really have access to her magic."

Sunset's horn lit up and the tip of Cadance's tail caught on fire.

"No, Sunset! Stop setting things on fire!" Cadance admonished, casting Elm's Expedient Extinguisher for the fifth time in less than an hour. "Fire bad! Fire bad!"

Sunset laughed and clapped her hooves.

"I'm sure I wasn't this bad as a filly," Cadance huffed. "I never set anything on fire. Not that I could. But it's the principle of the matter." She leaned in close to Sunset and looked her in the eyes very seriously. "If we ever have a foal together, you have to be the one to deal with teaching her magic. I won't have anything to do with it unless she has wings."

Sunset tilted her head.

"You'll understand when you're older," Cadance assured her. "Which hopefully won't take that much longer. Princess Celestia is working on a counterspell for this, and she probably knows more magical secrets than anypony else alive! I bet she's already got some great ideas and she just wants to make sure it'll work."

Cadance nodded and sat back. From what she could tell, Sunset was old enough that she needed solid food. Sure, she could probably manage just on formula for the few days until Celestia actually got this fixed, but an all-formula diet could tend to get messy in the end.

She giggled at her own pun.

"Okay, Sunset," Cadance said. "Now, here comes the train! Choo choo!" She picked up a snap pea. Sunset kept her mouth shut firmly. Cadance pushed it against her lips and Sunset turned away. When she tried a second time, the snap pea was abruptly on fire.

Cadance threw the pea into a glass of water, extinguishing it.

"No peas. Loud and clear," Cadance said. She blew on her hoof where Sunset had burned it. "I don't know why. I always loved those when I was a foal." She considered the plate. Maybe celery? That was relatively harmless. No strong taste and an appealing smell. Maybe Sunset just wanted something that smelled good. Snap peas didn't have much of a scent.

The stalk of celery was thrown out the window in a cyan aura before Cadance had even gotten to the point of taking a bite herself to show Sunset how good it was.

"There has to be something you like," Cadance said. "I know you've got teeth in there because you bit me when I tried burping you." She picked up a carrot. Sunset's eyes fixed on the bright orange, following it as Cadance moved it around.

"Oh, you like this, huh?" Cadance asked. She smiled. "Everypony likes carrots." She gave it to Sunset. The filly crunched down on it, chewing it happily. "Thank harmony. At least you won't starve to death while we figure this out."

She grabbed for something else. A slice of red bell pepper. Sunset dropped the carrot and reached for it.

"You just like really brightly colored food, don't you?" Cadance asked. Sunset took the bell pepper and ate it with even more gusto than the carrot. "Well, that's perfect. I'm sure there are all sorts of pretty food I can get for you." She smiled. What else was there to try?

Sunset made the decision for her, grabbing a small, rounded pepper from the tray. Cadance's eyes went wide.

"Sunset, you don't want to eat that. Put it down."

Sunset glared at her for a moment, then stuffed it in her mouth with what seemed like righteous indignation. There was a pleased look on her face for about two seconds, and then the spice from the habanero pepper hit her like a ton of bricks.

The plate was set on fire, thrown across the room, scattering flaming vegetables everywhere, and then Sunset started wailing.

"Why would they even put that pepper on there?!" Cadance asked, as she tried to put out the spreading flames.

"Thank you for help with the mending spells, Twilight," Cadance said. "I was really worried that I'd have to have the entire carpet replaced."

"It's nothing. I've optimized my version for dealing with burns," Twilight said. "Spike is going through his first flame. It's a lot like teething, but for dragons, and as the name implies there's a lot of fire involved." She frowned and leaned in. "I don't think Celestia expected him to start breathing fire yet. Does she really know anything about draconic growth patterns? I can't find any reliable research."

"I think she only knows what the dragons have told her," Cadance considered.

"That explains it," Twilight mumbled. "Anyway, I have something else that might help you. It's a little side project I was working on to make reading through Canterlot's archives more bearable." She took a scroll from her saddlebags. "I've been developing a translation spell that uses a more generalized methodology and translates concepts instead of just referring to a dictionary."

"How will that help?" Cadance asked.

"Well, if Sunset is still an adult up here," Twilight tapped her own head. "She might just be having problems controlling her magic and body. Maybe she can't form words because her mouth and vocal chords haven't grown enough! But my universal translator spell should work based on her intent, and enable her to communicate normally."

"That does sound helpful," Cadance agreed. She looked to where Sunset was sulking in her high chair, sucking on a bottle of milk. "It's safe, right?"

"Perfectly safe. it's actually cast on you, not her, so you can understand what she's saying. Let me know when you're ready."

"Go ahead," Cadance said, smiling.

Twilight nodded and cast the spell she had been tinkering with. Cadance felt something cover her ears for a moment like a pair of earmuffs. But instead of blocking out sound, they just changed it, slightly. She could almost understand the birds singing outside the window.

"And you're all set!" Twilight said. "It lasts almost ten minutes right now, which is really impressive considering the variables involved."

"Sunset?" Cadance asked, taking the bottle away from Sunset. "How are you doing?"

"I'm upset," Sunset's voice, pitched higher than Cadance remembered, said.

"I think it's working!" Cadance said, excited.

"I'm upset," the voice repeated.

"Sunset, I can understand you now. Is there something I can do to help? Do you remember anything about the spell that hit you that Celestia might be able to use to reverse this?"

"I'm upset!" Sunset said, louder. The filly started to cry. "Upset! Upset! Upset! Upset!"

"I don't think it's helping," Cadance sighed.

"It seems like it's just translating general concepts. I'm sure with a few tweaks, it'll be working perfectly," Twilight said.

"How long will it take?" Cadance asked.

"Oh, a decade, maybe two," Twilight shrugged. "It's sort of still at a proof of concept level. But it definitely works! I also checked it against Horse Latin, and it has almost a seventy-two percent translation accuracy there, which is really great considering the number of words available..." Twilight talked in one ear. Sunset yelled about being upset in the other. Cadance put her head down and groaned.

"Good news," Celestia said. "I've almost got the age spell working. I've been trying to narrow down the constraints to use, and they're going splendidly."

"That's good," Cadance sighed, happy. "I was worried it would take a decade like Twilight's spell. By the time she finishes, I won't need a translator, because Sunset will be old enough to talk on her own."

"The main difficulty is that I have to use a lot of power," Celestia said. "Sunset has exceptional magical strength, and it's only grown over time. If she was an adult, she would be able to understand what was going on and lower her unconscious defenses against enchantments."

"But you're strong enough, right?" Cadance asked.

"That's not the issue," Celestia said. "It's like..." She paused. "It's like trying to build a house when the only tool you can use is a twenty-pound sledge."

"I don't like the sound of that."

"Well, I've been testing the spell out on standard reference pears at the power level I'll have to use to overcome Sunset's spell resistance," Celestia said. "The first few aged until they turned into dust and blew away."

Cadance's eyes went wide and she grabbed Sunset, squeezing the foal protectively.

"The last few have been much more successful. They're still aging far more than I want, but it is at least a reasonable last resort."

"How is that a last resort?" Cadance asked.

"If we age her into an adult, even if it's older than we wanted, she'll be able to understand what's going on and I can use a lighter touch to reduce her to her true age," Celestia explained. "But I am worried about the kind of strain that might put on her body. Repeated transformations are not good for one's health."

"I don't want her to get hurt," Cadance said. "Even if we have to wait a little longer."

"There is... another option," Celestia sighed. "Not one I want to take, but it should at least be considered, for her safety if nothing else."

"What option?" Cadance asked.

"As you said, it will only take two decades for Sunset Shimmer to return to her adult self, taking the long route of simply growing up normally." Celestia looked away, unable to meet Cadance's gaze. "While it isn't ideal by any stretch of the imagination, it would be perfectly safe."

"But- she'd never want that!" Cadance gasped. "She wouldn't be able to see Midnight grow up, and she'd miss out on so much, and she and I..." Cadance looked down.

"I know," Celestia said. "And I'm not going to give up on finding a solution that will reverse the effects of the spell. I just want you to be prepared for the worst. Consider that Sunset never had a happy foalhood. As awful as this is, even in the worst outcome, something good could still come from it."

"But would she even still be the same pony?" Cadance asked. "I can't tell how much she remembers. What if she grows up and she's not... not like how Sunset should be?"

"There's no answer for that," Celestia said. "But I know that no matter what, we'll both be there for her."

Cadance nodded weakly.

It was the middle of the night. Cadance could tell because Sunset was crying, and Sunset had cried in the middle of the night for the last two nights in a row. It wasn't even about anything. She'd tried feeding her, and burping her, and swaddling her, and everything else she could think of.

Cadance stood over the crib. She just felt so tired. If it wasn't for the crying, she'd be in danger of just falling asleep on her hooves.

"I don't know how to make you happy," Cadance whispered. "What do you want? Is it the dark? You don't sleep at all when the lights are off. You just wake up at the same time every night and cry until you pass out from crying too much."

Sunset wasn't listening. She was too busy wailing in her crib. At least nothing was on fire.

"I don't know how parents do it," Cadance said. She sat down heavily, looking through the bars at Sunset. "You know, for a long time now all I've wanted was to make you happy. You saved my life, and you turned your own life around, and I've never met a pony who changed as much as you did."

She was quiet for a moment.

"A lot of ponies, they stay with partners that aren't quite right for them," Cadance said. "I see it all the time. They fall in love and they think 'if I can just get him to change those bad habits' or 'she'll learn to appreciate me'. But it doesn't happen. Ponies don't change like that. Not usually."

She stood up and walked over to her dresser. She had two photos on it. One from the first day she was in the castle, with Sunset glaring at her from Celestia's right side while she stood awkwardly to her left, the gap between her and the Princess showing how uncomfortable she had been with the idea of being part of the royal family.

The other photo was from only a few weeks ago. Sunset had taken Cadance out to a dinner in Prance. She'd spent days building a teleportation circle in secret just so they could sneak overseas in a heartbeat without anypony noticing. They'd gotten their picture taken in a little cafe, the sort of place that didn't even have a sign because the locals all knew where it was already.

Cadance couldn't see it clearly through the sudden tears that blurred her vision, but she knew that they were both smiling, that she'd wrapped her wing around Sunset, and that about five minutes after the picture was taken, the Royal Guard had finally figured out where they'd gotten to.

She sniffled and walked back to the crib.

"Everything was finally going right," Cadance said. "Why is it that I keep almost losing you? Are we just not supposed to be together at all?" She leaned in, halfway in the crib with Sunset, hoping just being there would help quiet her somehow.

Cadance couldn't stop the tears. She was just too tired. She hadn't slept, not really slept, in days. Every moment of those days, she'd been so wound up with worry about Sunset that she'd been constantly on the edge of having a panic attack, and now all that composure Celestia had taught her was finally breaking down.

Sunset's wailing slowly died down. Cadance didn't even notice until she felt tiny hooves wrap around her muzzle. Sunset was hugging her face.

"Are you worried about me?" Cadance asked, her voice breaking. "I'm supposed to be the one taking care of you, not the other way around."

Sunset gurgled something, giving Cadance a very determined look. Cadance smiled and picked her up, rocking her back and forth.

"It's okay, Sunset," she whispered. "I'm not hurt. I'm just sad. I'll feel better soon." She sat down on her bed, still holding Sunset. "My parents... the ponies who raised me, I mean, they used to hold me just like this and sing to me."

She fluttered her wings for a moment, trying to get comfortable, then cleared her throat.

Cadance had a beautiful singing voice. She'd never been classically trained, and it was a little lower than one might expect, more like an opera singer than a pop star. Her parents had always sung to her in Prench, and she held Sunset and sang to her softly, the foal's eyes slowly drooping until she fell asleep again, her face buried in Cadance's coat.

"Celestia is right," Cadance whispered, as she finished the song. "Even if I do have to wait another twenty years, I'll do it. I don't know if things would change, or if you'd ever remember what we had, but I'd still want to see the kind of mare you'd grow into."

She smiled and brushed Sunset's mane.

"And if I don't have to wait that long, at least I know you don't like peas or celery." She leaned down and kissed Sunset's forehead. "I love you."

"Good news!" Celestia said, as she burst into Cadance's room, more excited than Cadance could remember having seen the monarch in years. "I've found a way to break the spell without harming Sunset at all. Star Swirl wrote a spell that would return Grogar to his proper age and return the stolen youth he'd taken from his victims, and the basic principles are the same here."

Cadance looked up, blinking, a carrot halfway between her and Sunset. "You want to blast Sunset with one of Star Swirl's attack spells?"

"It's not precisely like that," Celestia assured her. "This is a spell that was very specifically designed to undo age-changing effects. It's a far neater solution than trying to age her the correct amount using the general age spell Midnight had been working with."

"And it's safe?" Cadance asked. "I know Sunset mentioned Star Swirl before. She said he was a hack who was only famous because he had a hat with bells on."

"Star Swirl dealt with a lot of unique magical problems," Celestia assured her. "And this spell has been tested in combat against an unwilling foe, and it worked perfectly."

"What's the worst that could happen?" Cadance said. "And I don't mean that as a rhetorical question. I really want to know, what's the worst thing that could happen?"

"Well, it could do nothing," Celestia said. "That would probably be the worst thing. Of course, Sunset Shimmer isn't a half-immortal goat, so it's possible that she could..." Celestia hesitated. "Well, I'm sure she'll be fine."

"What happened to Grogar when Star Swirl used the spell on him?" Cadance asked.

"Ah, that is, hm. He turned into a withered husk," Celestia said. Cadance's eyes widened in horror. "But it won't happen with Sunset! Grogar had stolen centuries from ponies across the land, and when it was all gone, he was left as an unliving creature of hate and dark magic. But, as I said, that almost certainly won't happen with Sunset."

"I'm not too sure about this..." Cadance mumbled.

"It'll be fine," Celestia assured her. "Now, get her out in the open, just in case she explodes."

"Explodes?!"

"It's a very technical magical term," Celestia explained. "It doesn't mean the same thing as the laypony term. To a laypony, an explosion is just all fire and things going boom!" She scoffed. "Of course, to a spellcaster, it means something completely different and technical."

Cadance slowly put Sunset in the middle of the floor. "And what does it mean, exactly?"

"It means that something very energetically becomes a gas, typically with a release of heat and pressure."

"Celestia!" Cadance gasped.

"I'm joking, Cadance. Of course she won't explode." She muttered 'probably' under her breath. "Now, step aside."

Cadance dutifully stepped to the side. Celestia's horn lit up. Sunset turned to Cadance, her little eyes wide with fear. Before Cadance could react, Sunset was enveloped by a sphere of golden light.

What Celestia had actually meant, when she said that Sunset might explode, was that it was entirely possible the age spell that she was trying to counter would not take well to being disabled. A well-constructed spell had failsafes and points where the magic would ground itself if the entire thing started to fail, fizzling out instead of turning into a disaster. Sunset had not been affected by a well-constructed spell.

There was a snap like static being discharged. A spark of energy shot out and slammed into a houseplant, the small fern shrinking down further and further until it was just a shoot, barely poking above the surface of the soil.

Celestia sighed in relief. The sphere of light twisted and inverted in a complex motion that would have been impossible for a real object, then popped out of existence. Standing on all four hooves, wobbling dizzily, Sunset Shimmer shook her head and tried to focus.

"Did anyone get the page number of the book that hit me?" She asked, before her eyes rolled back in her head and she collapsed.

"You really don't remember anything?" Cadance asked, as she picked over dinner with Sunset.

Sunset shrugged and ate one of the croutons in her salad, pushing lettuce to the side and nibbling on a red onion. "Maybe some vague stuff, but I mean, how much do you remember from when you were that age? I don't think it's possible to really form memories."

"That's too bad," Cadance sighed. "You were really cute as a filly."

"I'm not cute now?" Sunset asked.

"Not as cute as when your head was the size of your entire body," Cadance replied smoothly. "But I think I prefer you this way. You're much better at holding up your end of a conversation."

"Remind me to punish Midnight more," Sunset said. "I can't believe I lost half a week to this."

"It's not like you never caused trouble as a filly. I remember this one time, you ended up with a foal you didn't expect. Things did work out for the best in the end, though."

Sunset blushed. "That's totally different."

"Oh, I didn't realize," Cadance said. "I'll keep that in mind."

Sunset huffed and picked at her food. Cadance couldn't help but note that she ate the brightest food first.

Cadance's ears twitched. Between chews, Sunset was humming to herself.

"What's that song?" Cadance asked.

"I donno," Sunset shrugged. "Just something that's stuck in my head." She paused. "Do you know the tune?"

"I've heard it somewhere before," Cadance said. "The words go something like this..."

Chapter 17

"Princess, you don't have to watch me the whole time," Midnight said, trying to smile.

Princess Celestia was perched on a pillow a few sizes too small for her, all four hooves curled under her like a cat. She smiled back at Midnight.

"I had some free time, and I thought I would spend it with my student. Surely there's nothing strange about that?" Celestia's smile never faltered, even as she continued. "And I do want to make sure you don't accidentally break your promise to stay away from advanced spellbooks for another month."

"O-of course I wouldn't break a promise," Midnight said, starting to sweat.

"Well, that's excellent. I was also going to help you find research material on those reports."

"Reports?" Midnight asked, confused.

"Oh yes. The ones about why using untested spells is a bad idea. I believe you are supposed to write three of them." She paused. "Or perhaps it was four. In my old age, it's sometimes difficult to remember these things."

"It was three!" Midnight said, jumping on the fireball like a trained soldier. She knew from experience that Celestia did not negotiate when she punished somepony.

"Ah, yes. Three." Celestia smiled. "Due at the end of the month, after which we can discuss your library privileges again. I believe if the reports are exceptional enough, we could consider taking time off for good behavior. Assuming the rest of your behavior is similarly good."

"Yes, Princess," Midnight said. "So where should I start?"

"While the history section is the obvious choice for older examples, Equestria has a legal system that generates a considerable amount of paperwork. You might consider looking into the lawbooks, especially those dealing with reckless magical endangerment. They should include references to precedent that you can use."

"I'll get right to work on that," Midnight said. Once she was out of sight of Celestia, her head lowered and her ears folded back. This was going to be a long day. No, a long month.

She followed the shelves down to the section that held the thick, mostly faceless tomes of the law section. They stretched from where she stood, down a full ten bookcases, then around the corner, and she had a feeling she was looking at just the tip of the iceberg.

"There should be a book here somewhere that will help me sort this out," Midnight muttered. "Probably at one of the ends of the section. If it's not here at the start like a table of contents, it'll be at the end like an index." She nodded, pleased with her reasoning.

Midnight lit her horn to generate enough light to actually read the faded words on the spines of the books, and a glimmer from a high shelf caught her attention. There was a thick, black book there, with silver detailing on the spine. It was either the newest book there by a wide margin, or else it was preserved far more carefully than the rest.

"Of course," Midnight snorted. "The index for all this would have to be constantly revised. Naturally it would be the newest book." She grabbed it, taking it down so she could get a look.

Like the spine, beyond the abstract silver detailing, the cover didn't include a name.

"That's strange," Midnight muttered. She set the book down and flipped it open. The pages were thick, the whole thing printed on expensive paper instead of the cheap pulp she'd expect from a continually-revised reference tome.

"No title, no author listed..." She flipped past the first blank page and found a dedication just 'to her'.

Midnight tuned to the next page, and her eyes went wide. The pages were filled with illustrations, and when she looked closer, she could see it wasn't printed. The illuminations were all hoof-drawn.

"Oh wow," Midnight whispered. She looked around. Celestia wouldn't mind if she took a short break to read this, would she? It was probably a unique book, mis-shelved because of the lack of a title. She might not even be able to find it again.
Smiling to herself, she started at the first page.

"Once upon a time, in the magical land of Equestria, two sisters were given the throne after they restored peace and harmony to what had been a world of turmoil..."

Celestia waved to the crowd. There had to be hundreds of them gathered here, more ponies than she'd ever seen in one place. Their great enemy had always gravitated towards larger groups to spread his chaos. Cities had been abandoned, towns were left in ruins, and ponies were scattered across the world.

"I can't believe it's finally over," Celestia sighed.

"Of course, sister," Luna smiled. "Now we can finally live in peace."

"And learn to deal with some of these changes," Celestia laughed. "I wonder how long these wings will last."

"Hopefully long enough that I can teach you to fly better than a lame duck," Luna quipped, quietly enough that the crowd couldn't overhear.

"Says the pony who used her horn to pry open tin cans."

"It worked," Luna said, sticking out her tongue. "I told you I could figure it out myself."

"Who the heck is Luna?" Midnight asked, scratching her head. "Celestia doesn't have a sister." She put the picture book down and looked around. The legal books were some of the oldest ones in the library, aside from the manuscripts kept under lock and key - and she wasn't going to be able to look at anything that rare for at least a month.

"Maybe there are some references here," Midnight considered, grabbing the oldest book she could see and flipping through it. "Ugh. Horse Latin." She sighed and summoned a scroll and quill, starting to translate some of the more likely passages.

After a few hours and several more books, Midnight couldn't find a single reference to anypony named Luna. At least, not anypony who could have been a sister to Princess Celestia. There were plenty of ponies who had 'Luna' or 'Lunar' or 'Lune' in their name somewhere, especially in more recent history where there had been a fad in the mid-970s with moon names.

That would have settled it, if Midnight felt like she had anywhere near a complete record. Princess Celestia had assumed the throne over a thousand years ago, and if the book was referencing times around that takeover, well, there were big gaps in the historical record around that period.

Scholars said it wasn't really as though there were gaps or some sort of dark age, it was just that the printing press had yet to be invented, and the renaissance that took place later only took pains to preserve the 'classics', which at the time meant truly ancient works. Much had been lost simply because it was considered trivial and too new to be important.

Frustrated, Midnight turned back to the illuminated book, hoping she could find some details that she could tie to known historical events.

Luna breathed heavily as she stumbled into town. Most of the blood matting her coat wasn't hers. Most of it. It was the middle of the night, and almost every door was shut tightly against the dangers that still lurked in the darkness, the remaining beasts and monsters that still survived after the chaos lord had been overthrown.

The dark princess trotted to the well in the center of the village, drawing up a bucket and pouring it over her head, washing some of the blood away, the ice-cold water helping to revive her. She shook out her mane and looked around. Nopony had come out to look. Luna hadn't been quiet, but neither would a monster. It was no surprise that they weren't quick to leave the safety of their homes, given what she'd found in the woods.

"The displacer beast is defeated," Luna proclaimed. "It is safe here again, I promise you." She waited. A door creaked open behind her. She turned, smiling.

"P-please go," a mare's voice said, from behind the door. "I'm sorry. We can't offer you a feast or tribute. We have nothing."

"The only thing I want is-" Luna started. The door closed before she could finish. "-to see you smile," she whispered. She stood there for a few moments longer, her head bowed, before leaving, vanishing in a swirl of moonlight and sparkling dust.

"Weird," Midnight muttered. "So they'd leave tribute to her, and there were monsters in the dark..." She folded her forelegs and looked at the books around her. "That reminds me of Nightmare Night."

It was her favorite holiday of the year, except that one occasion when she and Twilight Sparkle had both worn the same costume. She was sure that hers was more accurate - Black Lotus had worn burgundy trim on his hat, not crimson trim, even if she had to admit that Twilight had been right about his staff having a twist to the right instead of the left.

"That gives me an excellent angle of attack! I can just read up on the history of Nightmare Night and it should lead me right to the source I need!"

Midnight groaned. A tower of books had collapsed on her. Maybe the librarian had been right when she said no living pony stacked books that way. It wouldn't have been bad if it hadn't been a tall tower of failure.

"Every book about Nightmare Night was written in the past century and just says it's based on ancient lunar and harvest festivals!" Midnight huffed. "How does that help? There should be at least some kind of record!"

She tossed the books burying her aside, not bothering to be careful. Mending spells existed for a reason, after all - to make sure she could fix things after she threw them across the room in frustration.

"The closest thing I can find is on Nightmare cults, and they probably don't even exist." Midnight paced around the clearing she'd made. "I mean, who would want to worship somepony who lost a fight? The only ponies who even pretend to do that are stupid teenagers."

She was, of course, excluding herself from that category. While she was a teenager, she wasn't stupid. She had plenty of certificates that proved she wasn't stupid.

"This is just like how the papers said O&O was a tool for dark magic and Tirek worship," Midnight muttered. She picked up the illuminated book, making sure she hadn't accidentally damaged it. "I guess I'm going to have to ask a primary source after all."

"Sister, please, this is serious," Luna said. "I need your help."

Celestia sighed without breaking the placid smile on her face, looking out over the ball from where she and Luna were perched on a high balcony. "Luna, you're jumping at shadows. We're at peace."

"It isn't peace I'm worried about," Luna said, more quietly. "The nobility shuns me, Celestia. There are barely enough ponies coming to night court to justify even opening the doors."

"Well you can't blame them, Luna," Celestia sighed. "Most of them have to work during the day. Don't you see them anyway when you walk through their dreams?"

"Yes, but..." Luna hesitated. "Dreams are private. I try not to make my presence known unless absolutely needed."

"You should change that," Celestia suggested, turning away from the ball to give Luna her full attention. "The only thing more beautiful than your night are the dreams you create. You should remind them that you watch over them there."

"I suppose, sister," Luna considered. "But there are some ponies that are actually hostile to me. I've heard rumors that they want to petition you to have my authority reduced."

"They can make as many petitions as they want, Luna, but it will never change anything between us," Celestia assured her, nuzzling her little sister.

"What if we had a combined court?" Luna asked. "Then they would see us rule side-by-side, as equals."

"Let's try my idea first," Celestia said. "If we had a combined court, with only two of us, they would also see us disagreeing. Besides, you deserve to have total authority over your domain."

"I suppose," Luna sighed.

"Come," Celestia said, sounding excited. "I think I see just the thing to brighten your mood - pear tarts!"

Midnight dropped the heavy black book in front of Celestia. The Princess tilted her head and looked at the tome curiously.

"What's this, Midnight? It doesn't look like the books I advised you to find." Celestia flipped through the pages. Midnight watched her expression carefully. She was still learning to read through Celestia's constant masked expression of serenity, but she couldn't detect any trace of surprise or real curiosity.

"It's something I found that was mis-shelved. It's a beautiful piece of art." Midnight kept watching her expression. Celestia wasn't really reading it, just glancing through the pages. Part of her was sure Celestia had seen the book before.

"It certainly is," Celestia agreed. "It looks like this was done in watercolors as separate paintings, then bound together. The time and effort to make it must have been prohibitive."

"Is the story true?" Midnight asked, bluntly.

"What's the story about?" Celestia asked, closing the book and giving it back to Midnight. Midnight put it down carefully and opened a few pages in to where she'd left off.

"It says here that you had a sister named Luna." She pointed to the dark alicorn standing next to Celestia in the painting, watching over Equestria from the clouds above with the sun and moon hanging between them, sharing the sky.

"Does it?" Celestia smiled.

"I can't find proof one way or the other," Midnight said, getting annoyed. "You can tell me. If it's some big secret, I'll promise not to tell anypony else about it."

"It would be very difficult to keep a secret about something like that," Celestia said. "For me, I mean. If you want to find the truth, there's a whole library here that should help."

"But you can just tell me!" Midnight huffed. "Just a simple yes or no!"

"Well, Midnight..." Celestia leaned forward. "I think that impatience is what got you in trouble in the first place. If you want something, you have to work for it."

"They're all so timid!" Luna snarled. She threw the mug she was holding across the room, the thick crystal shattering against the stone of the castle wall. "They won't even come out at night! When I appear in their dreams all they ever want is to sit in the sun!"

A maid silently picked up the pieces of the broken mug before an aura of golden magic enveloped them and brought them together, repairing the ruined tankard perfectly, not even leaving a blemish on its surface.

"Luna, calm down," Celestia said, harshly. "You're acting like a foal. And why are you drinking already? It's seven in the morning!"

"In case you have forgotten, not all ponies wake with the sun and cower in their beds the moment it goes down!" Luna snapped.

"It's still not polite," Celestia said. "Ponies will think poorly of you if they see you... like this, so early in the day."

"I apologize that not all of us can be perfect and flawless like you are," Luna scoffed. "Is that why you decided not to even inform me that you were holding a ball this afternoon?"

"You're normally asleep at the time," Celestia said. "I didn't want to trouble you."

"No, so instead you shun me like everypony else!" Luna growled.

"Our little ponies-"

"Your little ponies!" Luna snapped. "They certainly don't consider themselves mine! So much blood and sweat and tears spilled, and I'm not even worthy of being invited to my own sister's little parties!"

"Luna, calm down," Celestia said, standing up.

"Oh, I'm sorry, am I making a scene?" Luna asked. "Are you embarrassed to be seen near me? I apologize so much, sister! You'll never have to deal with me again, if that's what you desire!"

She stomped her hoof and teleported away in a burst of light, taking half of the table with her.

Celestia watched as the remaining half teetered and fell, grabbing her breakfast at the last moment and saving it from making an even bigger mess on the floor. She made no effort to chase her sister.

"How's the research going?" Sunset asked, surprising Midnight. She jumped a little and nearly ripped the page she was holding in the illustrated book.

"What are you doing here? Aren't you still supposed to be in court?" Midnight put the book down carefully before she could damage it.

"It's lunchtime," Sunset said. "Cadance was going to take me out to eat, and I wanted to check up on you."

"It's noon already?" Midnight mumbled.

"Ah, I see what this is," Sunset smiled. "You got so absorbed in your research you totally forgot what time it was. I remember when I studied so hard that I'd go days without food. Sometimes Celestia had to drag me out of my room and sit me down in front of a meal before my hunger caught up with me."

"I've been looking over this book I found," Midnight said, showing it to Sunset. "Celestia won't tell me about it. She just keeps telling me I should do my own research instead of asking her for all the answers."

"Let's see..." Sunset flipped through it quickly, her eyes glowing with the telltale glow of a speed reading spell. "It looks like a cautionary tale about how pride and jealousy can lead to your downfall. Pretty basic old mare's tale. Very nice production, though."

"Oh, is that a picture book?" Cadance asked, turning the corner. "I haven't read one in ages."

Sunset passed it over, and Cadance looked through it, taking more time than Sunset had.

"What a sad story," Cadance said, after she'd finished. "Clearly it's about how ponies who are close to each other are the ones who most need to watch out for what's happening to the ones they love."

"No, it's definitely about how pride comes before a fall," Sunset said.

"It's about love," Cadance corrected.

"You think everything is about love," Sunset said.

"Well, if you agree with me..." Cadance leaned in and whispered in Sunset's ear. Sunset turned bright red.

"It's about love," Sunset said, quickly.

"Do I even want to know what she said?" Midnight asked, warily.

"No. And tell Celestia you're staying in Twilight's room tonight," Sunset said, her tail twitching. "Come on, Cadance. I need lunch and maybe a cold shower."

"Out!" Luna screamed, the petitioner running from her fury. "Celestia, I demand to know what this is about!" She threw a scroll at her sister, Celestia catching it in the air.

"Court is canceled for the day," Celestia said, looking at the ponies around her. The nobility started moving at a slow, stately pace.

"OUT!" Luna bellowed, thunder crashing down and shaking the windows. The nobility, now sufficiently motivated, fled the room in a stampede. Luna seethed, waiting for Celestia to respond to her demand.

"It was a simple, harmless request," Celestia replied, once they were alone. "A farmer petitioned the court to increase the length of the day by an hour to help make up for the poor harvest last season."

"And you agreed without even consulting me!" Luna yelled, stomping her hoof hard enough to crack the tile floor.

"I tried," Celestia said. "For some reason, you decided to lock yourself in your chambers for a week instead of holding court."

"What's the point when I am the only one who attends?" Luna hissed. "They'd all rather bend knee to you and pretend I don't exist! I protected them for generations! I made the night safe and beautiful!"

"What is wrong with you, Luna?" Celestia asked, softly. "You weren't like this before. You used to want to make ponies happy."

"That's all I've ever wanted!" Luna screamed, tears running down her cheeks. "But you took it away from me!"

"Luna-"

"I know what this is really about," Luna said, quietly. "You want to be the only ruler of Equestria. You wanted me out of power!"

"That's not true!"

"I won't become a new piece for your statue garden," Luna growled.

"Please tell me?" Midnight asked, trying to make her eyes wider and more pathetic. "Pleeeease?"

"I told you, sometimes you need to find things out for yourself," Celestia replied. "Do you know the most important thing about teaching a pony?"

"Make sure you teach them the right things?" Midnight guessed.

"Not quite. That's important too, certainly, but the most important thing is this - you have to teach a pony how to find answers." Celestia looked around the library. "Look at all these books. Do you know what they represent?"

"Answers that I could find?" Midnight asked, sighing.

"They're all answers that another pony had to find out for themselves," Celestia said. "If you only teach by giving a pony answers, they'll only know what they've been told. If you teach by giving a pony tools to find their own answers, they can learn things on their own, and find answers that nopony else in the world has ever had in their hooves."

Midnight frowned. "But this isn't something I can find out on my own."

"No?" Celestia tilted her head. "So you're giving up already?"

"What else can I do? I can't find any answers here!"

"Do you think Clover the Clever only needed an afternoon spent in a library to discover the theory of magic compression?" Celestia asked.

"No, she spent a decade on it," Midnight muttered.

"Then why would you give up on a thousand-year-old mystery when you've only spent a few hours and read some books?" Celestia winked. "Sometimes, Midnight, the most important thing is to keep looking and to never give up."

"The night will last forever!"

"So she never gave you a straight answer, huh?" Twilight asked, as she fed Spike another shard of sapphire, the baby dragon nibbling on it with his new, very sharp teeth.

"When does Celestia give anypony a straight answer?" Midnight replied. She tugged a sheet over the cot. "Thank you for letting me sleep here on short notice."

"Just remember, you have to cast the silence spell," Twilight said. "The last time this happened we didn't cast one and none of us got any sleep until Celestia threw a bucket of water at them."

"Yeah," Midnight grimaced at the memory. "I won't forget."

"What did you do with the book?" Twilight asked.

"It wasn't marked as belonging in the library, so I took it with me." She pulled it out of her saddlebags from where she'd left them on the floor. "I was going to read it again tonight."

"Why?" Twilight asked. "It's not really a proper reference guide. It's just a foal's storybook about some princess that may or may not have ever existed. We should be focused on our studies. If you fall too far behind Celestia will make me tutor you again because 'we're supposed to be a team'." She spat the last part with so much sarcasm that it was almost a physical force.

"I'm not supposed to study magic for like a month," Midnight grumbled. "It's not like I have anything better to do unless you want to help me write those reports."

"I would, but Celestia would know if I helped you too much," Twilight said. "For one thing, they'd get done on time instead of a day late."

"I'm never late!" Midnight huffed. "I'm always on time. You just like being early and not giving yourself enough time to proofread and error-check."

"You've never proofread a thing. You stay up all night and write everything the day before."

"And I still get top marks," Midnight said.

Celestia collapsed as the shadowy form appeared on the moon. Just for a moment, she could feel her sister fighting against the imprisonment, the feeling slowly fading until she was...

Alone.

A tear dripped down her cheek. How had it all come to this? She'd had to do what was best for Equestria, no matter the cost. She took off her crown and stared at it.

"You were wrong, Luna. Maybe neither of us deserves to rule." She put it down in the center of the dull stones that had given her the power to defeat Nightmare Moon. To defeat Luna.

She looked up at the moon.

"I should have done something. I should have found a way to save you." She tried to stand, and couldn't find the strength in her legs. "What was I supposed to choose, Luna? Loyalty to Equestria, or to my sister? Duty to the ponies I serve or my own family?"

She looked down. That unblinking gaze from the moon bore into her, like Luna was still there, silently judging.

"I'm sorry."

"Well maybe you'll become Nightmare Twinkle and try to plunge Equestria into eternal..." Twilight paused. "Midnight? Dusk? Something like that."

"That's so lame," Midnight snorted, from her bed. "You're obviously way more likely to go crazy. Remember when I turned off your alarm clock and you had like ten panic attacks at once?"

"That was you?!" Twilight gasped.

"Of course it was!" Midnight rolled her eyes. "It was revenge for when you wrote a book report on the same book I did and you came to a completely opposite conclusion on the author's motivation."

"It's subjective," Twilight huffed.

"It's not subjective!" Midnight said. "They played naked volleyball!"

"We're almost always naked!" Twilight rolled her eyes.

"You just can't understand the pure love that a stallion can have for another stallion. Or are you going to tell me the shower scene was supposed to be chaste, too?"

"The Wonderbolts aren't like that," Twilight said. "They're just a stunt team. They're not some weird herd with rotating membership."

"Ugh. You'll understand when you're older."

"We're the same age."

"I grew up with Cadance around me all the time. I've seen things." Midnight shivered.

"Please change the subject," Twilight said. "Now I'm thinking about - things I don't want Spike to know until he's an adult. In dragon years."

"Well, there is something I wanted to run past you," Midnight said. "At the end of the book, it says that Nightmare Moon will return on the eve of the one thousandth Summer Sun celebration. That's only, like, five years away!"

"So I'm going to have to put up with you jumping at old mare's tales for five years? Wonderful."

"No, no," Midnight said. "I've got an idea on how we can make sure it doesn't come to that. All we have to do is blow up the moon!"

"Blow up the-" Twilight frowned. "What?"

"Blow up the moon," Midnight repeated, calmly.

"You can't blow up the moon," Twilight said.

"I'm pretty sure it's possible if we chain spells using a crystal array. I haven't done the math, but I know you're better at that, so-"

"Millions will die," Twilight said. "And Celestia would be really disappointed."

"But we'd save Equestria!"

"Ugh. Go to sleep, Midnight," Twilight groaned.

"Fine, but in a few years when Nightmare Moon comes to destroy Equestria, you're gonna say 'Darn, Midnight! I sure wish we'd blown up the moon like you'd wanted!'"

Twilight mumbled something sarcastic.

Locked away, somewhere quite distant from the castle, Nightmare Moon stirred in her sleep.

Chapter 18

One tradition at the School for Gifted Unicorns that had survived since its founding was that all test results were posted publicly. There had occasionally been petitions to change the practice, but given that the requests had always come from those scoring near the bottom of the list, they were typically ignored — the students either improved and no longer cared about having their scores posted, or they proved that they needed to have their courses adjusted and they were moved to a more appropriate class (or, occasionally, moved out of the school entirely).

Typically, the top of the test results would be one or two students who had gotten a perfect score on the test. Unfortunately for the rest of the class, Twilight Sparkle had never met a grade curve she couldn't break.

"A hundred and ten?" Twilight asked. "I was sure I'd have at least a hundred and twelve. I'm going to have to talk to the teacher about that extra credit essay." She sighed and walked away from the list posted on the bulletin board outside the classroom, Midnight following her.

"Isn't that the one where you needed three extra pieces of paper and included suggested additional reading?" Midnight asked. She'd gotten a hundred and eight. Lower than Twilight, but still well above the third-place grade of ninety-five.

"Extra credit is a place to shine," Twilight said. "If you're going to do it, you need to take it seriously."

"Twilight you spent like three hours on that test. I was done in half an hour. It's about time efficiency."

"No, it's about the fact that I'm two points higher than you," Twilight retorted, smugly.

"Two whole points!" Midnight rolled her eyes.

"Feel free to slack off," Twilight continued. "Maybe Princess Celestia will notice and finally realize that I'm the only one she really needs as a student."

"Twilight!" A pony yelled from behind. Midnight and Twilight turned at the same time to look at the pony yelling to them. She was a soft off-white cream colored pony with a bright orange mane with white tips. "I'm so glad I caught up to you! Congratulations on getting the top score. Again."

"Thank you," Twilight said, bashfully. "Um..."

"Come on, Twilight, you know me," she smiled.

"Orange Creme," Midnight whispered, in Twilight's ear. Twilight mouthed a silent 'thank you' to her double.

"Of course I do, Orange Creme." Twilight coughed. "S-so how did you do on the test?" She had no idea how to approach a conversation like this. She didn't even have her 'Unexpected Conversation' flashcards with her! Twilight cursed at her own unpreparedness. She should have known that she'd need the flash cards instead of a spare slide rule!

"I only got an eighty five," Orange Creme sighed. "But you know, I was thinking - you're always at the top. You must have a lot of really effective study tips."

"Oh!" Twilight sighed in relief. Studying was definitely something that she'd consider herself an expert at. "Well, I do have a few things I do that make things easier."

"That's great!" Orange smiled. "I really want to improve my score. I doubt I can get it as high as yours, but I want to do as good as I possibly can, you know?"

"Absolutely," Twilight agreed. "There's nothing worse than not knowing how to prepare yourself for an exam! I'd be happy to help. I can bring you a checklist of topics to study for the next test-"

"Well," Orange Creme hesitated. "I do know what to study. It's not about the content, I think it's more about my habits, you know?"

"That's harder to fix without knowing more about them," Twilight considered.

"Exactly!" Orange Creme nodded. "So what if you came over and we studied together for the quiz at the end of the week? Then you could see how I'm studying and I can see how you study."

"I don't know..." Twilight considered. It would definitely slow down her own studying if she had to help somepony else who was falling behind – she wasn't even an A-average student! – but Princess Celestia kept subtly and not-so-subtly encouraging her to make friends with the other students.

Midnight rolled her eyes and walked away. Twilight watched her go and considered her. She had almost gotten the same score as Twilight, and with much less of an opportunity cost in terms of time taken.

Maybe it was worth helping another student to get on Celestia's good side, even if the few hours taken would lower her expected point return by a few decimal points.

"Okay," Twilight said, smiling more confidently. "I'll help you."

"...So my dad isn't here most of the year because he's in Manehattan and the farm on weekdays, but Mom doesn't mind much," Orange Creme said, as they walked into her house. It was one of the smaller manors, not quite as large as the one Twilight had lived in for most of her life, but it had a surprising amount of land around it, mostly filled with orange trees. Twilight wasn't sure how they were kept as healthy as they were in the unsuitable environment of Canterlot, considering the colder temperatures and higher altitude, but she was far too nervous to interrupt and ask.

"Uh huh," Twilight nodded, listening.

"You might know my mom," Orange Creme continued. "Her name is Cream of the Crop. She manages the agricultural taxes and subsidies for the Royal Revenue Service."

"I think I've seen her once or twice," Twilight nodded. "I don't know if we ever spoke."

"That wouldn't surprise me," Orange Creme shrugged. "She's usually pretty busy. Working with government money means she has to cross all her 'i's and dot every 't'. Or something like that."

"Um... right," Twilight agreed, deciding wisely not to correct her. Orange Creme led her through a rather sensibly furnished home. Twilight couldn't help but notice a few Earth Pony touches. Larger doorknobs, a harder floor with less plush carpeting, electric lighting instead of magical.

"This is my room," Orange Creme said, opening the door. It was... well, pretty much exactly what Twilight expected. It was pleasantly tidy, with framed posters on the walls. Orange Creme held out a bowl. "Want an orange? There are a couple different kinds here."

"Are they fresh?" Twilight asked. "I didn't think oranges were even in season."

"Well, this time of year Dad mostly sells hothouse oranges, marmalade, and a couple other kinds of citrus that handle the fall and winter a little better. These are fresh, though. The bowl is magic and keeps anything stored in it from spoiling. I made it myself!"

Twilight tilted her head and scanned the enchantment. It was a little messy, but worked well enough to assure her that the oranges would indeed be fresh.

"Sure," Twilight said, taking a smaller one to be polite. Orange Creme took one with a reddish hue and put the bowl back.

"Tangerine. Good choice," Orange Creme nodded with approval.

"Where would you like to start with studying?" Twilight started unpacking her saddlebags, taking out a few books and her personal scrolls. "I was thinking we could go over what the teacher talked about in class today."

"Sure," Orange Creme agreed. "Can I have a copy of your notes?"

"Huh?" Twilight asked, blinking.

"Well, yours are probably more complete than mine," Orange Creme said, taking out her own notebook and showing a page of chicken scratch and doodles. "They'd be a great study guide."

"I guess I can make a copy for you," Twilight said.

"Great!" Orange Creme said, smiling.

"How did your study group go?" Celestia asked, over dinner. Today, the kitchen had apparently decided that pasta florentine was the way to go as a main course, with wide strips of butter-fried portobello mushrooms mixed in with the spinach and cream sauce.

"It went well," Twilight said. Orange Creme had certainly been happy to get the notes. "Though we didn't end up studying as much as I normally do. Apparently she likes to take breaks every half-hour and do something else. It's probably a time-management issue and..." Twilight trailed off, blushing. "I mean, it's fine."

"Oh, what sort of things?" Cadance asked. "I remember when I was in high school I'd find all sorts of ways to get distracted when I was supposed to be studying—" She stopped when Sunset kicked her leg.

"It isn't like that," Twilight blushed. "She asked for my help. Princess, you always said that the best way to ensure you actually know a topic is to try and explain it to somepony else."

"That's absolutely right, Twilight," Celestia agreed, nodding in approval. "And I'm also glad that you're making friends."

"Really?" Twilight asked, smiling.

"Of course." Celestia glanced at Sunset. "The value of friendship can be something that takes a pony, even a talented one, a long time to learn."

"Not this again," Sunset muttered.

"Is my little Sunny-wunny embarrassed about Celestia talking about when she was a foal?" Cadance asked. Sunset blushed at the baby voice, and turned bright red when Cadance followed it with a kiss to the cheek. Her horn flared, and a flickering wall of magical energy formed between them.

"Princess, I think we need a bucket of ice water," Midnight said. "Again."

"The maids were quite annoyed last time," Celestia noted.

"Um, Princess?" Twilight asked. "Is there anything special I should do? I don't really have a guide for this whole... study group thing. Is there a book with a checklist—"

"Just do what feels right," Celestia assured her. "That's the most important thing with friendship."

"Studying your notes really helped," Orange Creme said. "But I still only got a ninety on the quiz, and there's a big test coming up."

"That's a statistically significant increase. You had an eighty-five before, so when you look at it in terms of how many questions you missed, you decreased your missed total by more than thirty percent," Twilight said. She wasn't entirely sure how Orange could be making mistakes. All she had to do was memorize the study material. "I think what we need to do is work on the way you take frequent breaks. I've been looking at some guides on how to use positive reinforcement to really improve basic performance." She pulled out a few scrolls.

"Actually, I came up with an idea that's even better," Orange Creme said. "I think we've been going about this all wrong."

"What do you mean?" Twilight tilted her head.

"Okay, so, part of the reason studying is difficult is that you basically have to study everything the teacher talked about in class, assigned for homework, had as a reading, and so on, right? And even then, there's a chance she'll put a question on the test where the answer is only in the book because she never went over it."

"Well, we're expected to read the book even if she doesn't assign it," Twilight noted.

"That's true. But it's a lot of material, and that doesn't even take into account that all tests are basically the same way." Orange Creme started pacing, peeling an orange with her magic as she walked back and forth. "What we're doing right now is studying everything and hoping we remember the parts she decides to put on the test. But that's sort of backwards, isn't it?"

"How is it backwards?" Twilight sat down, confused.

"If the goal is to get a high score on the test, we shouldn't be reviewing all of the material and hoping it includes what's on the test. We should be studying the test itself!" Orange Creme smiled. "That way we make sure we're actually learning the answers that we need for the exam."

"Well..." Twilight considered. "I guess if we took all the previous tests and looked for patterns, we could make a generalized format that would help guide us towards the types of facts the teachers usually include on the exams, but even then it's unwise to avoid studying everything because there are always a few obscure questions and the extra credit could be almost anything at all and-"

"No, no," Orange Creme said, waving a hoof. She sat down and started eating the orange. "See, this is the brilliant part. We study the test we're going to take, not past test examples."

"How are we supposed to do that?" Twilight asked. "It's not like the tests are in the book."

"The teacher makes them in advance, Twilight! All you need to do is get a copy of the test before the exam and we can get all the answers from the book. Then it's just a matter of memorizing the correct answers."

"But that's cheating!" Twilight gasped.

"Twilight..." Orange Creme sighed and put a hoof around her shoulders, pulling her into a hug. "Think about is this way. If you do this, you'll be completely prepared. There's no way there can be a surprise question. A hundred percent, guaranteed!"

"It's not right, though..." Twilight muttered.

"I thought we were friends," Orange Creme frowned. "We tried doing things your way and it helped a little. Can't we at least try it my way? It's not like we'd really be cheating. We'd just be taking the test in advance."

"I just..." Twilight hesitated. "Can I think about it?"

"Of course," Orange Creme smiled. "Just don't tell anypony about it. If we decide not to do it, we shouldn't get in trouble just because we'd talked about it, right?"

"R-right..." Twilight bit her lip.

"Are you feeling alright?" Midnight whispered. "You've been pale ever since you came back from Orange Creme's."

"I'm just feeling kind of sick," Twilight whispered back, casting a quick privacy spell so the teacher wouldn't notice them talking to each other. It wouldn't really silence them or make it look like they weren't talking, it would just subtly encourage the teacher to look elsewhere and not pay attention. "I think I ate something that didn't agree with me."

"What, did you try mixing lemon juice and milk again?"

"No!" Twilight blushed. "That was just the one time! I thought creamy lemonade was a good idea and forgot that milk curdles."

"Uh-huh," Midnight said, skeptical. "You know, if you're not feeling good, you should tell the teacher and go see the nurse. I don't want everypony ending up sick like when Comet Wishes came in with the stomach flu and threw up on her desk."

Twilight shuddered at the memory. She'd ended up running a fever hot enough that Celestia had almost put her in the hospital. The dreams she'd had were... unpleasant.

"I'm not sick like that," Twilight promised. "I'll be fine."

"If you say so." Midnight yawned. "Wake me up if the teacher calls on me."

"You're going to take a nap?" Twilight blinked.

"I've got a recording spell on my quill, and I read this whole section last night. Just keep the Can't-See-Me spell going."

"Ugh. Now I know why I feel sick," Twilight rolled her eyes. "I'm stuck next to somepony with no work ethic."

Twilight looked down at the scroll. She'd been trying to figure out what to do for hours now, and it was already getting close to the point where she wouldn't be getting any sleep at all before her lessons with Celestia.

"If I don't help her get a copy of the test, I could lose a friend, which will mean Celestia will be disappointed in me," Twilight said. "If she thinks I'm not really trying to make friends, I'll lose that edge I have over Midnight."

She checked that off on the 'Do' side.

"But if I do try to get a copy, there's a chance that I'll get caught. If I get caught, not only will Celestia be disappointed, but I'll be in trouble with the teacher, and the school, and my parents will probably disown me and—" She started hyperventilating.

The panic attack ate up a good ten minutes of her time. Once she'd collected herself, she put a check on that item and moved down the list.

"If I do get a copy, I'll be being a good friend, which Celestia has told me repeatedly is important. And if I really wanted to, I could... look at the test myself." She swallowed.

"And if I don't get a copy..." she hesitated. "I wouldn't be in danger of being caught."

She hashed together a quick grid.

"If I don't get a copy, I can't get caught, so that's one null result and one bad result where I'm a bad friend. If I do get a copy and I don't get caught, I'm a good friend and not in trouble. If I do get caught... I'm in trouble, but I tried to be a good friend."

She put down the quill, looking at the choices in front of her.

"Given that one choice is a negative and a null, and the other is a positive and a negative, the only reasonable action is to get Orange Creme a copy of the test. But that negative is weighted really heavily." She bit her lip. "I need a foolproof plan."

Twilight checked off a box on her checklist.

"Get to school an hour early. Check." She'd skipped breakfast to ensure she'd be able to get there in time, telling the maids to let Celestia know she wasn't feeling well enough to eat. It wasn't even a lie. She was feeling queasy just thinking about what she was going to do.

Twilight cast a quick spell and pulled a mirror out of her saddlebags. She couldn't see herself in it. She also couldn't see the mirror.

"Invisibility spell, check. Note to self, is a mirror still a mirror if you make it invisible? Investigate in spare time with spells that use mirror as a focus." She checked it off on her list. Probably. It was also invisible now, after all. She was sure the mark was very close to the box.

An unfortunate consequence of her plan revealed itself as she realized she could no longer read the remainder of the plan she'd come up with. It had only been a few hours since she'd decided on it, so she was going to have to hope she'd remember how it went.

Twilight started scribbling a note to make a checklist she could read while invisible and stopped halfway through the first word when she realized she'd lost her place and was probably writing on top of her checklist. She put the scroll away to avoid damaging it further.

She crept into the halls of the school, moving as quietly as possible on the hardwood floor. A Soften Surface spell muffled her hoofsteps, but left a short-lived trail behind her like she was walking on a pillow. She considered the tradeoff to be worth the risk.

Twilight's first attempt to get a copy of the test had been rather simple - she'd attempted to use divination spells to just view the exam remotely. Unfortunately, it seemed she wasn't the first pony to think about trying it, and it was only a quick disjunction effect that cut off the link before the wards around the teacher's desk managed to trace the scrying spell back to her. She'd nearly been caught right there, and it would have been impossible to disguise it as anything innocent.

Compared to divination spells, physically entering the school and trying to get a copy was probably far more dangerous. If she could teleport, she'd at least have a quick escape plan, but she was nowhere near close to mastering that spell. The last time she'd tried, she'd managed to move about six inches, flip herself upside-down, and get her tail stuck in a wall. All at the same time. It had not been a good Tuesday.

Twilight pressed against the wall as a teacher walked past, holding her breath. She waited until the professor was around the corner before continuing, getting to the classroom door.

"Okay," Twilight whispered. "Now to get this open..." She'd memorized several different charms to crack locks. She hadn't had a lot of time to test them, so she figured in this one case, quantity would do instead of quality. One of them was bound to work, and with any luck the door wouldn't explode.

She plotted it out in her head. If it was a tumbler pin lock, she could use Lightfoot's Liquid Lockpick. A more secure lock would require the Door Buster Nine Thousand, though against a normal wooden door it risked damaging both the door and frame. As a last resort, she could use Warp Wood to pop the door out of the frame entirely, at least temporarily. She touched the doorknob, remembering what she'd read about the feel of locks, to see if she could determine the difficulty class of the lock involved.

The doorknob turned.

"Or it could have just been left open," Twilight muttered, as she slipped into the dark room.

The teacher's desk was right in front of her. All she had to do was open a drawer and make a decision that would change the rest of her life. Easy.

She swallowed, her throat dry.

"Here," Twilight said, quietly, putting a folded paper into Orange Creme's saddlebags.

"Is that what I think it is?" Orange Creme asked, equally quietly. Twilight nodded. Orange Creme smiled and pulled her into a quick hug. "I knew you could do it! I won't ask for details. With this, we'll be able to get the top score without even trying!"

"Just, um..." Twilight looked down. "I haven't looked at it. Just enough to make sure it was the right one. I don't want to use it."

"What? You went to all that trouble and you're not going to take advantage of it?" Orange Creme raised an eyebrow.

"I just... wouldn't feel right about it," Twilight admitted.

"But you still did it for me?" Orange Creme asked, surprised. She hesitated. "That means a lot to me." She looked down. "Come on. I'm going to treat you to ice cream. I know it's not much considering what you went through, but you really look like you could use a pick-me-up."

"Ice cream does sound kinda nice," Twilight admitted, smiling weakly.

"Only the best for my bestie," Orange Creme smiled.

Twilight followed after her. She still didn't feel right about all this, but now she was Orange Creme's best friend. That was probably worth it.

Maybe the ice cream really would help. Sugar and fat were well-known for improving a pony's mood.

If nothing else, it'd definitely help fill up the pit she felt in her stomach.

"Wow," Midnight said. "Twilight, what the heck happened?" She looked up at the list of test scores. "You only got... a seventy-seven?! Even Trixie managed to get an eighty and she's Trixie!"

"Hey, Trixie resembles that remark!" Yelled the filly, from across the room.

"See? She's totally Trixie," Midnight said, waving a hoof at the irrefutable evidence. "Though I guess I'm more surprised that Orange Creme got the top score. Unless your really amazing study tip was to write her name on your paper and she wrote yours on hers."

"I just... haven't been feeling well," Twilight said. It was more or less the truth. "I couldn't really focus."

"I can tell," Midnight said. "Maybe you should take a couple of days off and rest."

"I can't take time off," Twilight said. "If I do that, I'll fall even further behind! My brother always says that when you don't feel well, the most important thing is to push through and try your best, because ponies are still counting on you even if you aren't feeling at your peak."

"That sounds like an awesome way to get yourself hurt," Midnight rolled her eyes. "You know, my suspension from the restricted section is almost over. I bet Celestia would let us go if we agreed to go together. How about hitting the library with me?"

Twilight shook her head. "I'm just going to go study for the next test," she said, weakly.

"If you say so," Midnight said, getting even more concerned.

Twilight didn't even look up from her books when the knock came on her door. She didn't answer until the second polite rapping at the door frame.

"It's open," she sighed, unlocking it from across the room.

"When Midnight said you weren't feeling well, I knew I had to come and see it for myself," Celestia said. "If she was worried about you I knew it meant you were doing very poorly."

Twilight spun at her mentor's voice and bowed. "Princess! I'm so sorry! I didn't know it was you! I thought it was just the maids bringing the soup I requested!"

"I decided to bring it myself," Celestia smiled. She hovered a tray over to Twilight's bed. "Roasted red pepper soup with smoked mozzarella cheese, plus a pot of herbal tea. I know you didn't order the latter, but I find that it helps quite a bit when I'm under the weather."

"You didn't have to bring it to me," Twilight said, smiling a little as she took the cover off the soup. It smelled lovely.

"I also wanted to check up on you. You did seem distracted during our last private lesson, and Midnight came directly to me and asked that I look into it myself. She is a very spirited filly, when she has something she wants."

"I guess," Twilight muttered.

"What's wrong, Twilight?" Celestia asked. She closed the door and stepped closer, sitting on the rug next to Twilight's bed. "You don't look quite as sick as I feared. Did something happen with your friend?"

"N-no, she's been really nice," Twilight said. It was the truth. Orange Creme had been nothing but nice ever since they'd started talking.

"If it's something private, you don't have to tell me," Celestia said. "Just know that you can tell me anything, and I won't judge you."

"Thank you, Princess," Twilight said. "It's just something I think I have to deal with myself."

Celestia nodded. "Then I'll bow to your judgement, Twilight. I hope you feel better soon." She stood up and opened the door.

"Wait!" Twilight said. Celestia closed the door, not turning around. "I just... I could use some advice."

"Of course, Twilight," Celestia said. "What can I help you with?"

Twilight bit her lip. "I think I did something wrong. I don't know how to deal with it."

"Why don't you explain it to me?" Celestia suggested.

"My friend... she wanted my help improving her grade. First, she wanted my help studying, and a copy of my notes, and I gave them to her because I thought it would help, and her hornwriting was terrible."

Celestia nodded. Twilight continued, the words coming faster and faster like water pouring out of a broken dam.

"But that wasn't enough! Her tests only went up a few points, so then she told me that the best thing to do would be to copy the test and use that to study and get all the answers in advance and I snuck into the school and copied it like she asked because I didn't want to lose her as a friend and now I don't know what to do because it's like I helped her cheat on her last test!" Twilight huffed, out of breath.

"Twilight..." Celestia sighed. "I'm glad you told me the truth, but I'm also very disappointed in you. You should have known that it wasn't the right thing to do."

"I'm sorry," Twilight whispered.

"Do you remember the first day you spent here as my student?" Celestia asked. "Your mother brought you to the throne room, I even let you sit in my throne. I never forgot the way you looked, such a small filly sitting in such a huge chair, how much growing you had to do in order to live up to the expectations you were saddled with."

She paused, not turning back to Twilight.

"Later, when I saw just how far ahead you were from all the classmates around you, I knew I'd made the correct decision in making you my student. I've never questioned that until now."

Twilight started shaking where she sat.

"The first duty of every scholar is to the truth. Philosophical truth, historical truth, scientific truth. If you really consider yourself a scholar and a student, you need to tell the truth to the ponies that most need to hear it - the teacher whose test you copied and your friend who made you complicit in this fraud."

"Yes, Princess," Twilight said, weakly.

"If you don't tell the truth about it, I will," Celestia noted. "Good night, Twilight." She opened the door again and left Twilight alone with her thoughts and her rapidly cooling meal.

"I think you're making a mistake," Orange Creme whispered, while they waited in front of the teacher's office.

"Even if the Princess wasn't going to do it herself, I have to tell the truth," Twilight said, sadly. "I can't live with myself otherwise."

Orange Creme looked down. The door opened.

"Come in," the teacher said, gesturing to the seats in front of her. "I assume this is going to be about your unusual test performance in the last exam. I'm afraid I do not offer retakes, except in exceptional circumstances."

"This is sort of an exceptional circumstance," Twilight whispered. "The truth is... I gave Orange Creme-"

"I made Twilight give me a copy of the test," Orange Creme blurted out. "It's my fault. She felt so bad about it that she couldn't study, and I cheated on the test. I wanted to confess."

"Orange-"

Orange Creme silenced her with a shake of the head.

"This is a very serious matter," the teacher said. "Do you understand what that kind of confession means? You'd immediately go before the board of review and they would have to decide if you deserve to remain at the school. Given your academic record, I can't promise that you'd even stay until the end of the day."

"I know, Ma'am," Orange Creme said. "But Twilight doesn't deserve to get in trouble for this. It's my responsibility."

"I see. Please wait here." The teacher got up and left her office.

"Orange, what are you doing?!" Twilight hissed.

"Twilight," She scoffed, smiling. "I took advantage of you. You're so naive. I just wanted to improve my test scores by leeching off of you but... I've had a lot of fun hanging out with you, too. You deserve to be here way more than I do, so if somepony has to take the heat for this, I will."

"B-but-" Twilight sniffled.

"Don't worry. You're still invited over anytime. Uh, assuming I'm not grounded for the rest of my natural life," Orange laughed a little.

Orange Creme opened her hooves and Twilight leaned in, accepting the hug. She only cried a little.

Above them, unseen, a scrying sensor winked out, the pony at the other end of the spell satisfied about what she'd seen.

"A zero?!" Twilight gasped, when it was all over and she and Orange Creme were left alone for a moment to talk.

"Hey, it was the least punishment they could give me," Orange Creme said. "I mean, I did cheat. I deserve a zero. It's not the worst thing in the world, but I'm really going to have to bust my flank to come back from that." She sighed.

"What about your parents?" Twilight asked.

"They're really disappointed. Don't expect me to pay for any ice cream for a while - my allowance is gone until I'm old enough to get a job of my own." She laughed a little. "I'm sorry I put you through all that, but at least you got away without being thrown in the dungeons."

"They put an official notice in my records," Twilight said. "That's going to be there for the rest of my life." She looked down. "Even if I always get perfect grades, ponies who look at my academic scores are going to see that and I'll have to explain what happened."

"I'm sorry," Orange Creme said.

"For what it's worth, I'm sorry too," Twilight said. "I was just so afraid you'd stop being my friend that I didn't really think about what I was doing."

"I'm not such a great friend," Orange Creme shrugged. "Not worth all that trouble, that's for sure. Hey, maybe we can actually study next time we get together. I'll even take my own notes."

"If they even let us," Twilight said, looking at her hooves.

"I'd rather risk asking than go right to summer school without even trying," Orange Creme joked. "At least I'd have to mess up even worse than usual to have to repeat the whole grade. They almost made that my punishment."

"Repeating a grade?" Twilight went pale.

"Hey, hey, don't look like that, I managed to talk my way out of it," Orange Creme said. "Still friends?" She held out a hoof.

"Yeah," Twilight smiled. "Friends."

Chapter 20

Celestia looked up at the moon, then down at the chess game in front of her. She was sitting on her balcony, alone, in the middle of the night. Getting fresh air helped her think and, unlike some ponies, she wasn't too fond of flying at night. A few too many bad landings at a young age had made her skittish of flying in anything less than perfect visibility.

"You know, of all the problems that I could have expected to have, there were some I simply didn't anticipate," Celestia started, not exactly speaking to herself, but to somepony who couldn't reply and, hopefully, couldn't actually hear her. "I was worried I would have to find somepony at the last minute, but instead I'm spoiled for choice. So many brilliant ponies, any of whom would be worthy of the role I need one of them to play, even if I've had to keep some important truths from them."

She moved a pawn, then one of her opponent's, seeing in her mind's eye what they would have done. This was a game they'd played quite often.

"I suppose I should take it as a blessing, but part of me doesn't want to risk any of them. It's my duty to Equestria to make sure that it is kept safe, no matter the cost but..." Celestia hesitated.

She moved more pieces, thinking. The game quickly ended in a stalemate, the board emptying until all that remained were the two Princesses, circling each other.

"For a very long time that meant I had to be there for Equestria," Celestia said, as she reset the game. "I couldn't risk myself. If I fell, what would happen to the world?" She moved a pawn.

A black pawn mirrored it, and Celestia stopped. The logical first move was to use the opening to develop her center, but maybe for this one game, she'd try something different.

She moved her Princess up into the space the pawn had vacated. It was an insane early move, exposing it to all sorts of danger, preventing her from castling.

"But... sometimes the princess needs to lead the way."

She looked across the board, and for the first time in over a thousand years she had no idea what move her opponent would make. She smiled.

"A vacation?" Sunset and Cadance asked, at the same time. They looked at each other.

"Jinx!" Cadance blurted out, before Sunset could.

"Girls, please," Celestia smiled. A genuine smile. Seeing them getting along made her feel more secure about her decision. "It will only be for a few days. You've handled things just fine without my input for longer than that before."

"But you were always around in case of an emergency," Sunset said. "What if something happens and we don't have a way to contact you?"

"Then you'll have to handle it without me," Celestia said, evenly. "Sunset, what could possibly happen that you would be unable to manage without me?"

"War could be declared!" Sunset said.

"That's why I'm leaving Cadance in charge of our international affairs," Celestia smiled. "While you do have a way with some of the ambassadors, I've noticed that the Zebrican delegate keeps trying to get away from you."

"Well, uh..." Sunset blushed. "We were having a meeting once and she kept interrupting me, and I got frustrated and maybe I overreacted and now she thinks I'm possessed by some kind of demon."

"I could order you to apologize," Celestia noted.

"Not while you're on vacation," Cadance noted. "Assuming you're being held to the same standards as anypony else in the government, while on a leave of absence you aren't allowed to do any official work, which includes giving orders to subordinates."

"Ah yes," Celestia noted. "That law had to be passed after Iron Hoof tried making his accounting clerks come in on their time off and work. He claimed that since it was paid time off, he should be able to decide what they were allowed to do with it."

"I'm not sure about this whole thing," Sunset said. She glanced at Cadance and considered her words carefully. Celestia smiled. She'd already prepared herself for this. She'd played out the whole conversation in her head.

First, Sunset would say that she didn't think Cadance would be tough enough on the diplomats, and that in Celestia's absence they'd push for trade deals and contracts to be signed that Celestia would never allow, but which Cadance would give in to easily, especially if they made threats.

Then Cadance would counter that Sunset was being too hard on the ponies at court and that they wouldn't take well to her exercising power without having Celestia there to back it up.

Both of them, ultimately, would want to be in charge of everything. All Celestia had to do was use the little speech she'd prepared about how different viewpoints were vital and that if they were concerned, they should be a team instead of enemies. Then she'd make them hug. She liked making ponies hug.

"I just don't know if I can really... fill in for you," Sunset sighed. Celestia blinked. This wasn't quite how it was supposed to start. "I mean, Cadance, sure. Ponies love her. Even without you around they're going to look at her and respect her decisions without question."

"That's not true," Cadance smiled. She put a wing around Sunset. "You're much better at keeping ponies in line than I am. They listen to what you say instead of what they want you to say."

"Aww, Cadance," Sunset blushed. "Come on. You know what I mean. Maybe you should just sit in at court, too. I can still be there to advise you, but they'd see royalty on the throne."

"I'm not going to undermine your authority like that," Cadance said, shaking her head. "Besides, I need you to help me keep the Griffons from declaring war on us. The ambassador is going on about Griffonstone again. I think they're going to try making another push to claim their 'ancestral lands' north of Manehattan."

"What, again?" Sunset rolled her eyes. "Didn't they learn their lesson last time when we slapped them with trade embargos on manufactured weather? They had to beg for aid after their crops failed in the drought."

"You see?" Celestia smiled. "Both of you are well-equipped to handle this. Just, um..." She decided just to plow through with the speech. "Work as a team, cover each other's weak points, and don't be afraid to talk about the problems each of you are having."

"I guess," Sunset said, quietly.

"Both of you need to understand something," Celestia said, very seriously. "For a long time, I've had to rule Equestria on my own. You might not think you're ready to fill in for me, and that's my fault. I'm not as perfect as I'd like to be, it's just that the current system has grown up around me to support my faults. I need to leave so I can make sure Equestria can handle itself without me."

"Without you? Why?" Cadance asked, concerned. "Did something happen? Are you sick?"

"No," Celestia smiled, softly. "But I am very old. And immortal, so don't get it into your heads that I'm dying of old age. I am not. I am, in fact, quite young and healthy for an immortal." She patted herself on the chest. "Strong as a horse."

"You know, that's sort of a speciesist Zebrican saying-"

"It's not speciesist if you're a pony," Celestia cut in. "The point is, if something ever happened to me, I want to make sure I leave Equestria in good hooves. Think of this as something like a fire drill - you never want a fire, but you do need to make sure ponies know what to do in case one happens."

"Okay, but how do we contact you in case of an emergency?" Sunset asked.

"You don't," Celestia smiled. "That's the point." She patted a pile of papers. "I've left an assignment for Midnight and Twilight while I'm gone. If they finish, I have a backup assignment in my desk."

"This is just kind of sudden," Cadance said. "Maybe if we had a few days to prepare everypony?"

"Don't worry. I've sent letters to a few ponies to make sure there won't be any rioting in the streets." Celestia smiled. "Remember, I want you to actually deal with things, not just defer them until I come back."

"Yes, Princess," Sunset rolled her eyes.

"None of that while I'm on vacation," Celestia said. She took off her crown and put it on her desk before wrapping Sunset and Cadance in a hug. "I'll be back in a few days."

Before either one could reply, Celestia vanished in a burst of golden light, her teleport spell taking her far away enough that even Sunset couldn't trace it.

Celestia slurped. It wasn't a refined, princessy thing to do. That's why she was on vacation. She looked into her cup, really half a coconut, and found that behind the cute little umbrella and swirly straw, it was empty. She was out of mango daiquiri, again. She sighed and tossed it aside, her hooves dangling into the salty sea. A few small fish poked at her hooves, nibbling gently at them. It felt ticklish.

"I've really missed doing this," She said, to nopony. Nopony was around, after all. She'd chosen an island in the middle of nowhere, an uncharted little tropical paradise, the kind of place she'd gone to be alone before the whole mess with...

That thought made her feel suddenly guilty. But she had a cure for that.

"More drinks!" She clapped her hooves together, and a drink appeared in front of her. It was a spell that had originally been developed in Stalliongrad, and in the original form could only make vodka. A few hours of tweaking it on the beach had turned it into the perfect way to get a cocktail when there wasn't a bar around.

"I think I'll call it Celestia's Happy Hour," Celestia said, as she settled back into her beach chair, the sun shining down on her. This time it was blue raspberry. "The randomization part was the really brilliant bit. I wonder if I should publish this one or keep it secret to avoid turning my little ponies into alcoholics..."

She rolled the idea around in her mind.

"Nah. All for me. Otherwise it'll make the bartending industry collapse, like that time I figured out how to make cake out of nothing and the baker's union tried to overthrow the throne."

Celestia nodded, satisfied with that reasoning.

"I'd have to turn the strength way down, too," she noted. "These are like, really strong. If I wasn't an alicorn I'd probably have passed out by now."

Of course, she could hold her drink far better than any mortal pony.

"Wake her up," the bosun said. She was a huge, intimidating pony that clearly had some griffon in her recent heritage. Well, huge compared to anypony except Celestia. "The Cap'n wants to talk to her."

"We tried, ma'am." The pony wiped his forehead. He was sweating from the effort of dragging the unconscious alicorn aboard. "She's out like a light. Tried splashing water on her face, shaking her, everything we could think of. I think she's passed out from the rum, Ma'am."

"Throw her in a cell until she sleeps it off," the bosun sighed. "The Cap'n isn't going to be happy."

Celestia snored loudly, smiling while she dreamed of seaponies.

Celestia stretched. Her front hooves hit a wall. Her back hooves hit iron bars. She yawned and looked around. She was in a cell. For her, a very small cell. Her back was sore from sleeping on dirty planks. Her head was sore from all the rum, but that would clear itself up quickly.

"I don't remember going to sleep on a ship," Celestia said. She spotted a plate and cup left near the bars, and sniffed at them. "Ah. Grog and bread. That does take me back."

She poked at the bread. It was the kind of stale, mealy bread you got when the flour had been cut with sawdust. Not exactly her favorite lunch.

The grog was similarly of low quality, which is saying something since it was already grog to start with. Aside from being tepid, there was a metallic smell to it that spoke vividly of the poor quality of both water and rum that had gone into it.

"I really am going to have to rate these accommodations as quite poor," Celestia noted. She rubbed her chin. "But I think I can make myself comfortable."

"Cap'n, I'm just saying-" the bosun said, following along behind her captain. The bearded pony scoffed and waved her away. He had a cutie mark of a half-buried treasure chest, two peg legs (both on his right side) and an understated but very stylish hat, as appropriate for a pirate who worked for a living.

"She's just a pony, Miss Gilly. I don't care what she said t' try and scare you off." Captain Woodbeard trotted (half-trotted, anyway, the other half being something more like a limp) down the stairs towards the cells. "I'll get th' truth out of her soon enough."

"She is an alicorn, though, sir," Gilly replied. "We checked twice to make sure the horn and wings were real."

"That just means she'll fetch a high price when we reach Trotuga," Woodbeard smiled, showing wooden teeth. "If she was really all that powerful, do you think she'd still be sitting in a cell on the ship?"

Woodbeard turned the corner, ready to taunt his prisoner and tell her about the terrible fate what was before her. Unfortunately, the moment was ruined with an awful slurping sound.

"I love pina coladas," Celestia half-sang, as she drank from the bright, fruity drink held in her magic. She paused to eat a nacho.

"Ah..." Woodbeard stopped, confused.

"Huh?" Celestia raised her sunglasses to look. "Oh, you must be the Captain. Would you care for some nachos? I made quite a lot and I'm not sure I can finish them." She offered the plate to them.

Woodbeard reached for the plate, and Celestia pulled it back just before he could touch it.

"Hah! Sorry. Not 'cho nachos!" She giggled and ate more. "You can have the bread and grog, though. They're not really vacation food."

"...Where did you get that drink? And that food?" Woodbeard demanded. "I don't even have tortilla chips on this boat!"

"I'm on vacation," Celestia said, as if it explained everything. There was a long pause as if the Captain was expecting a longer story. There was not a longer story forthcoming.

"I changed my mind, bosun," Woodbeard said. "You were right. She's too dangerous to have around. Bind her wings. We're gonna have her walk the plank and then sail away from these cursed waters."

"Walk!" Captain Woodbeard demanded. Celestia trotted halfway out on the plank, then turned.

"No, you walk." Her horn lit up, and she switched places with the Captain. He sputtered, walking back onto the ship and pushing her towards the plank.

"Bucking– you walk! Get off my ship!"

"Nope," Celestia said. She switched places with him again, and he was suddenly pushing out into thin air, stumbling and falling, only barely catching himself before tumbling into the water, hanging onto the plank with one hoof.

"Pull me up, you idiots!" He hissed. "I only got one good forehoof!"

"You know what?" Celestia said, after a moment. She pushed through the crowd, ignoring the Captain and looking around. "I think I'll take this boat. It's my boat now."

"You can't just take my boat!" Captain Woodbeard yelled.

Celestia's horn lit up, and she plucked the hat from his head, settling it on her own.

"I have the hat. I'm the captain now. That's how it works, right?" Celestia asked, looking around for confirmation.

"Uh..." Bosun Gilly coughed. "I don't really..."

Celestia stomped a hoof and the plank under her shattered. Captain Woodbeard fell into the water with a loud splash.

"Yes," Bosun Gilly corrected. "You're the captain now. Ma'am."

"Great!" Celestia smiled widely. "Okay, for my first order, give Woodbeard a longboat and some supplies. Decent supplies. Enough that he can get to land safely. Then, have the navigator plot a course to somewhere nice."

"Somewhere nice, ma'am?" the bosun asked.

"Sure. You all look like you could use some shore leave. I think the pirate port of Trotuga is near here, right? That sounds fun. We'll go there."

"I ain't sure if that's what I'd call nice, Ma'am. And I'm surprised you know about it what with how you're a princess and the Navy hasn't been sent to clear it out..."

"Places like that sometimes serve a need," Celestia said, with a ghost of sudden seriousness that made Gilly almost kneel. A few of the other crew did, instinctively. She brightened up after a moment. "Anyway, who wants a daiquiri?"

"Contact off port!" yelled Poop Deck, from the crow's nest.

"Looks like a Navy ship!" Crow's Nest yelled, from the poop deck.

Celestia frowned at that. She wasn't sure why they called it a poop deck, really. Really, even the crow's nest didn't work well. Out at sea it was mostly gulls and sometimes a pelican or albatross. Still, she had bigger concerns than just naming conventions.

"Which navy?" Celestia asked.

"Equestrian, Ma'am, so, uh..." Crow's Nest hesitated. "Yours, I guess?"

"I'm on vacation," Celestia said. "They're not mine. I guess they're technically Princess Cadance's right now."

"That all may be so, Ma'am," Gilly said. "But they're coming right for us. I don't suppose you can pull some kinda rank and make them surrender?"

"Even if I tried, they'd probably assume it was a trick," Celestia admitted. "What's more likely? Finding me in charge of you lot or finding a pirate ship that had a few tricks up its sleeve?"

"The latter, Ma'am," Gilly agreed. "But speaking of tricks up our sleeves, we've got some long-range guns that the former Cap'n was keeping in reserve. If we bring 'em out now, we can get in some decent shelling afore they're close enough to broadside."

"I'm not going to kill anypony," Celestia said. "Not while I'm on vacation."

"That ain't going to stop them, ma'am," Gilly said. "If we don't do something we're just going to be sitting ducks."

"Hmm..." Celestia looked at the distant ship. "I've got an idea."

"Commodore!" A strapping young lad saluted the pony as he approached. "We've confirmed that it is indeed the Floating Potato."

"Ah yes," Commodore Stacked Decker smirked, sipping at her tea. "Woodbeard won't be getting away from us this time." She gripped her cup more tightly in her magic, the porcelain cracking. "Not after what he did to the Constellation. Putting us all on a sandbar that went under at high tide and left us swimming for our lives..." She growled.

"Ma'am, the water was only six inches deep."

"Did I ask you for your opinion, swabby?!" Decker yelled. "Get us in firing range! I want the Floating Potato to be on the bottom of the ocean before dinner!"

"This will never work," Gilly muttered.

"Of course it will," Celestia assured her. "I've done this before, and I was even more drunk the first time I tried it."

"You'd have t' be drunk to think of it," Gilly said.

"Quite true," Celestia agreed. "But you have to admit they'll never expect it."

"Ma'am! There's a longboat coming this way! She's flying a white flag!"

"A longboat?" Commodore Decker frowned at that. It smelled like a trick. "How many are onboard?"

"No one, Ma'am. There's just the flag and what looks like a fruit basket and a few bottles of wine."

"What?"

"They blew it right out of the water," Gilly noted, putting the telescope down. "Didn't even try taking it onboard."

"That always works!" Celestia huffed. "Who would blow up a fruit basket? I need to have a serious talk with the Grand Admiral when I get back. This behavior is simply rude."

"Begging your pardon, Ma'am, but while it's nice and all that you're immortal and will live through this, the rest of us can't say the same and we'd prefer not being strung up by the neck." Gilly looked up at the approaching ship. She was gaining on them. "Do you have any other ideas, or shall we open fire?"

"Well, I suppose there's one more thing I could try," Celestia sighed.

"Load the cannons," Decker said. "Prepare to turn and engage." Ponies moved about her like an efficient, organized machine. A machine that served Equestria, but more importantly, hunted pirates. She hated pirates. Pirates had stolen everything from her.

"Ready to fire," the master at arms called out.

"Fire," Decker ordered. There was a resounding silence. Then the organized machine of ponies around her seized up in confusion as it tried to figure out just what had gone wrong.

"What did you do?" Gilly asked.

"Nothing much. A little seawater in the powder to keep it from igniting." Celestia sipped at her drink. "So, I think the next thing to do is a warning shot from our guns."

"Fire a warning shot!" Gilly yelled. "Right across their nose!"

A cannon boomed, and the figurehead at the front of Decker's ship exploded into splinters.

"Tartarus! I said across their nose, not up it! Who fired that shot?!" Gilly demanded.

"I did, sir," A deckhand said, stepping away from the pack. Wobbling a little as her crossed eyes occasionally made her unsure just where the deck actually was.

"Aren't you that mailmare?" Celestia asked, blinking.

"I got really lost trying to deliver a package to Los Pegasus, Captain Princess Ma'am," the grey pegasus saluted. "I'm trying to earn enough money to get home."

"But Los Pegasus is halfway around the world," Celestia said, slowly.

"I'm not a clever pony, Captain Princess Ma'am."

"Noted," Celestia said. "Bosun Gilly, please prepare the crew for a boarding action."

"All the powder on the ship is wet?!" Decker yelled. "How did this happen?!"

"Looks like a curse, Ma'am," the master at arms said. "Had to be some powerful magic. Water even seeped into the ship's secondary magazine. We're unarmed aside from sabres."

"Then we'll fight them hoof-to-hoof," Decker declared. "I want every pony on board ready to meet the boarders! We're going to show them that the Equestrian Navy isn't going to give up just because we don't have our cannons!"

Decker drew her blade, a silver and gold sword that had been presented to her by Celestia herself.

"We're going to drive them back, then take their ship the old-fashioned way!" Decker declared. The crew cheered as the pirate ship pulled up alongside the Constellation II, the Floating Potato looking like its namesake, brown and oddly lumpy and malformed. Pegasai flew into the air from the pirate ship, landing in the rigging of the Constellation.

A magical burst cleared part of the deck, pushing ponies aside, and four white hooves set down on the deck.

"Good afternoon, everypony," Celestia said.

"It's Celestia!" one of the deckhands yelled. "We're saved!"

"Why's she got a hat on?" asked one of the more observant deckhands.

"I've come to accept your surrender," Celestia said, smiling. "I didn't want anypony to get hurt."

"It's a pirate trick!" Commodore Decker yelled, rushing forwards. "Cut her down and-"

The sword was plucked from her grasp with the effort of a trained marine taking candy from a baby. Celestia held the blade curiously, looking at it.

"Ah, yes, I remember this," Celestia said. "I gave this to you on your wedding day. Spring steel and gold alloy inlays. Quite a fine blade. You've kept it in excellent condition." She returned it to the Commodore, putting it back in its sheath.

"How did you-" Commodore Decker paled.

"I'm not so old that I forget everything," Celestia laughed. "How have you been, Commodore? I don't really get to see my naval captains much, with how long you spend in the field. It seems like most of you only come in once or twice a year, and you've missed the last few naval reviews."

"I've been busy," Commodore Decker muttered.

"Hunting pirates, yes," Celestia smiled, a little sadly. "What happened to your husband wasn't your fault. He would have wanted you to be happy."

"I just-" Decker looked away. "Why are you here?! Why were you on that ship?! What's going on?!"

"Oh, I'm on vacation," Celestia shrugged. "It's my ship now."

"What about Woodbeard?"

"He's..." Celestia considered, thinking. "I think he's that way?" She pointed. "He was rowing quite quickly after Bosun Gilly fired a warning shot. Then again, after the warning shot we fired at you, I can see why."

Commodore Decker looked around and considered her options. "Well, then. I can see this is in hoof. I can give you a few of my men to help capture the rest of the pirates, then we can bring them to the Black Roost for trial."

"No."

"I know you have things well in hoof, your highness-"

"No, I mean, I'm actually here to accept your surrender, Commodore. I'm not a princess right now. I'm a pirate captain, and I have a duty to my crew." She adjusted her hat. "I'd prefer if everypony here surrendered peacefully. I assure you that no one will be harmed."

"I..." Commodore Decker shook in frustration and nodded.

Celestia smiled and hugged her, taking off her hat and giving her a playful noogie. "Don't worry, Commodore. We'll be out of your mane in a moment. We're just going to take a few things and be on our way. You wouldn't believe how awful the bread onboard a pirate ship is."

"Mmm..." Celestia licked her lips as she took a bite of the tomato, lettuce, and cheese sandwich. The bread was a freshly-baked loaf, or at least tasted like it. The Equestrian navy had used enchanted food lockers for decades. It was far more efficient in the long run to have good food and good morale at the cost of a little magic.

"So what now, Ma'am?" Bosun Gilly asked. She looked up at Celestia's new hat. She'd taken the Commodore's hat and put it on top of the one she'd taken from Woodbeard. Her horn punched through them and kept them from falling from their precarious perch.

"Now we make for Trotuga," Celestia said. "We've got some bits to burn and a tale to tell. I'm sure our little pirates would like some shore leave, too."

"Yes, Ma'am," Gilly nodded. "Are you sure about leaving the Navy ship like that? They'll be able to repair the damage to their rigging in a day or two at the most."

"I'm counting on that," Celestia said. "They're only doing their job. Commodore Decker... I hope she thinks about what I said. She really does need to find a more healthy way to deal with her grief."

"Ain't really my place to ask Ma'am, but what did happen?" Gilly asked.

"She lost her husband to a pirate. Or more accurately, a very attractive pirate queen. She's been tracking down pirate ships ever since then trying to find him and drag him home." Celestia shook her head. "He was a good-looking stallion, but he'd chase anything in a dress."

Trotuga was exactly what Celestia had expected from a pirate port. She'd never been there herself, but there were a number of ponies that were actually agents of the crown - the exact number kept almost as secret as their names.

Their anonymous reports had described it as lively and active, in the same way a rotting apple was lively, and the residents were about as welcome in polite society as said things found living in a rotting apple. If she had been in the business of becoming a pirate queen, she would have taken over and cleaned the place up a bit.

Of course, Celestia was not in the business of becoming a pirate queen. She was on vacation, and being a pirate queen sounded distressingly like work.

"And then-" Celestia snorted. "Then the whole cake exploded! I thought someone was trying to kill me, but it turned out my pet phoenix fell into the batter! Philomena was overweight for the next three reincarnations from all the sugar and chocolate that got mixed in with her ashes."

Gilly chuckled from across the table. She looked around the bar nervously.

"I thought more of these lowlifes would be afraid o' having your sort here," Gilly said.

"No one is afraid of the mare buying everyone rum," Celestia smiled. "Half of them probably think I'm a hallucination."

"I suppose there's truth to that," Gilly sighed.

"I'm curious, why did you become a pirate? It's rare I get to relax and talk to anypony or anyone in your situation."

"Ma'am, I'm a half-griff. Not welcome in the Empire, not welcome in Equestria, and Griffonstone's the closest thing to a home we can have, on account of being sort of a third option." Gilly frowned and swigged at the bottle of rum. "And that place is a dungheap and has been since afore I was born."

"There's no reason you wouldn't be welcome in Equestria," Celestia protested. "I've worked hard to make it welcoming to people of all races."

"Officially, I'm sure you're right," Gilly agreed. "But you know how hard it is for a carnivore t' get along? Unless you're already rich y' can't afford to eat and hunting's so close to illegal that the only way you can get away with it is livin' so far outside of civilization that y' might as well be in bloody Zebrica."

"I wasn't aware," Celestia muttered.

"Course not. Most of the griffons you see are only there for a few days, or they're noble-blooded featherheads. They ain't got the same problems."

"It's something I'll have to change. A long time ago, my sister told me that ponies were getting too soft and that they were intolerant of anything that didn't fit into their safe little world. I was... younger then. I thought that I was keeping them safe. Maybe I've kept them too safe."

"Don't say that, Cap'n," Gilly shook her head. "They might be coddled, but let me tell you - most other countries look at Equestria and they see a land of opportunity. People go there because it's a place they can make a new start."

"But not you," Celestia smiled sadly.

Gilly shrugged. "It ain't like you can sit down with everyone in the world and fix all their problems. You shouldn't even if you could. People need to solve their own issues or else they never grow up."

"Mm." Celestia sat back, taking a long draw from the bottle after Gilly passed it back to her.

The bar door opened. Celestia didn't think much of it until Gilly tapped her on the shoulder and pointed with a talon. Celestia glanced back and blinked. Ponies were filing into the bar, their eyes glowing dimly with blue magic. All of them looked drained, somehow.

"Their cutie marks are gone," Celestia whispered. She'd only seen a few creatures that could do that kind of thing. It was worse than chaos magic or necromancy. Only abyssal magic could actually remove a pony's cutie mark.

"Orders, Cap'n?"

"I shouldn't have to deal with this," Celestia sighed. "I'm on vacation!"

"I'll round up the men and try t' make for the ship, then," Gilly said. "We can raise anchor and get out of here afore this goes bad."

"It's already bad," Celestia sighed. "I guess I really can't get time off." She adjusted her hat (or hats, plural) and stepped through the growing crowd of zombie ponies, just pushing them aside. At least they didn't seem bloodthirsty. Just... confused and dazed. Like they were sleepwalking.

Outside, Celestia stopped and looked around. Usually with a massive magical disturbance like this, there was some kind of obvious sign. A cackling necromancer. A filly floating in a giant sphere of high-energy magic. Something to point the way.

"Ah," Celestia noted, as she saw the pillar of light coming from down the road. She followed it to what might generously be called Trotuga's good section, the part where fences and smugglers dealt with large sums and, in return, demanded decent security and somewhat less filth.

A filly, no older than her own students, stood at the center of the flare, a magical book at her hooves.

"Why won't it go away?!" She snarled. Her cutie mark glowed, sparkled, and seemed to waver for a moment before snapping back into focus. It was a fairly normal mark for a unicorn, a star and a few swirls in a stylized spiral. It almost resembled her now, the cyan energy a raging torrent reaching up into the sky from her body.

Celestia watched as the magic struck down, uncontrolled, hitting a pony with a coin on his flank. The cutie mark tore free like it was a sticker attached to his side, and he stumbled away, bumping into a tree.

"Why won't what go away?" Celestia asked, stepping closer. The magic tried to reach down to her, and was turned away with a thought, the spell grounding against the earth.

"My cutie mark!" The filly growled. "This should work! It worked on everypony else! But the spell isn't working on me!"

"I doubt it will allow you to remove your own cutie mark," Celestia noted. "Though I'm not sure why you would want to in the first place."

"Because I hate it!" The filly screamed. She stomped her hooves and threw the book at Celestia. Celestia caught it in midair and closed it, putting it down safely somewhere behind her. The spell started to fizzle, the cloud of spiraling energy above the filly sputtering and losing cohesion.

"Why would you say that?" Celestia asked. "It seems like a perfectly normal cutie mark for a pony with a talent in magic." A surprisingly strong talent in magic. That made four fillies that were absurdly strong that she'd met in just the last few decades.

"Because all cutie marks are awful!" The filly looked at Celestia for the first time. "And-" her eyes went wide. "P-Princess Celestia?! So it's true, you really do execute anypony who uses dark magic!"

"I'm on vacation," Celestia said, adjusting her hat. "So just Celestia. Or Captain Celestia."

"...Captain?"

"If you want. And what's your name?" Celestia smiled.

"Starlight. Starlight Glimmer." The pony sat down, looking at her hooves. "Just make it fast, okay?"

"I'm not going to execute you," Celestia rolled her eyes. "I wouldn't do that even if I wasn't on vacation. But I am going to ask you to break that spell that you used to take cutie marks from all those ponies."

"Why?" Starlight muttered darkly. "They'll be happier without them."

"Why would you ever think that?" Celestia asked, sitting next to her.

"Because! Cutie marks only cause problems!" She huffed. "My best friend left town and never came back because he got his cutie mark. And most ponies stop caring about anything once they get their cutie mark! They just follow it blindly like it's the only thing that matters in their lives!"

"You're not entirely wrong," Celestia admitted. "And there are two reasons for that. First, a pony's cutie mark is almost always in something they're really interested or excited in. It's very rare for a pony to get a cutie mark that isn't in something they're interested in."

"So?" Starlight looked up, frowning. Tears filled her eyes, but she refused to cry in front of Celestia. "Ponies act like they're not allowed to have an interest except in whatever their cutie mark is!"

"It feels good to be good at something," Celestia said. She pulled a bottle of rum from under her wing and took a sip. "A pony's natural magic doesn't really start to flow until they have a cutie mark. A lot of pegasi can't fly before they have it, unicorns can't form spells, earth ponies can't connect with the land, that sort of thing."

"...and?"

"Once it bursts out with that cutie mark, well, they're suddenly much better at whatever it is they were doing. And they almost always try to follow what their cutie mark is telling them to do, because it comes naturally to them."

"But it's stupid! Can you imagine being one of the ponies here? What if you had a cutie mark of a skull and crossbones? Or a knife? Or something else where you've got a brand on your flank for the rest of your life that says 'I'm a criminal and all I'm ever going to be good at is criminal things'?"

"It's a bit of a self-fulfilling prophecy, isn't it?" Celestia agreed. She took another swig then offered the bottle to Starlight.

"I'm not really old enough to drink..."

"We're in Trotuga," Celestia snorted. "Just drink it slowly. It's navy strength."

"What does that mean?" Starlight took a sip and gagged.

"It means it's strong enough that even if it fell into black powder, the powder would still burn," Celestia explained. "Though I'm not sure that has ever come up as an important combat tip. I think it's more because the navy likes to consider themselves big tough sailor stallions and they won't drink weak rum."

Starlight snorted with laughter at that. She took another sip and kept this one down.

"I just want to stop losing friends," Starlight said. "If ponies didn't have cutie marks, they'd stop running off to segregate themselves. All the ponies with flower cutie marks go to grow flowers together. All the ones with baking cutie marks open bakeries together. All the ones with magic cutie marks run off to some stupid school and abandon their best friends." She huffed.

"I know what it's like to lose a friend," Celestia said. "I've lost a lot of them, for a lot of reasons." She took the bottle back and drained half of it.

"Uh, Princess, should you drink like that?"

"That's Captain Princess to you," Celestia huffed. "I've got a hat."

"Yes, Ma'am," Starlight said.

"I've lost more friends than you can imagine," Celestia said, looking up at the sky. She'd set the sun a few hours ago, and the moon was hanging overhead, staring down in silent judgement. "Sometimes I feel more alone than you can imagine. I'll be surrounded with friends, and I'll realize how much I'm reminded of something that happened centuries ago, and no one else in the world even remembers it."

"Does it ever stop hurting?" Starlight asked.

"No," Celestia sighed. "But after a while you stop thinking about it every day. Eventually you forget entirely until you see something that reminds you, and you feel it all over again."

"Oh," Starlight whispered.

"There's only one thing that can help with it. Well, two things." Celestia smiled. "First, rum. I have found very quickly on this vacation that rum is the cause of and solution to all of life's problems."

"And the other thing?" Starlight took the bottle when Celestia offered it, not drinking but just holding it.

"Making new friends," Celestia said. She took off her hat and put it on Starlight's head. "I'm making you the new captain of the Floating Potato. She's a fine ship with a fine crew."

"What? But- I'm just a filly!"

"A filly who was casting Abyssal magic," Celestia noted. "That means you have to be ruthless, cunning, and powerful. Otherwise you'd be dead by now from the backlash. I think you'd make an excellent pirate."

"...I'm not sure if that's an insult or the nicest thing anyone has ever said to me."

"Probably one of those," Celestia agreed. "And I want you to have this, too." She gave Starlight a scroll, the paper appearing out of nowhere. "I'm authorizing you to act as a privateer in service of Equestria. You can prey on other pirates, slavers, smugglers, and maybe get away with a little more as long as you don't get caught." She winked.

"You're telling me to break the law?"

"Starlight, I'm the ruler of Equestria," Celestia said. "My job isn't to lord over ponies and tell them what to do. I serve them. And sometimes, that doesn't mean following the laws. I think I've made a poor habit of neglecting the trees and only looking at the forest, if you'll let a drunken old nag ruin a metaphor."

"I think I understand," Starlight said.

"Good, now let me introduce you to your crew."

A few hours later, after Starlight Glimmer had sworn not to enslave anypony with dark magic and Celestia had finished drinking her under the table, Celestia slipped out of the bar and walked out into the night. She passed by the ladies of the evening, the sleeping drunks, and a few muggers who were alert and intelligent enough to decide they had somewhere else they really needed to be.

She walked out to the end of an unoccupied dock and sat down, looking over the water and up at the moon.

"So, I guess even my relaxing vacations are pretty eventful, aren't they, Luna?" Celestia asked. The moon didn't answer, the loudest sound around her the quiet lap of waves against the dock.

"I really miss you, Luna," she said, quietly. "Especially on nights like this. I wish you could see how much things have changed since we first came to power. I wish you could meet the ponies I've met."

Celestia stopped, pulling out a full bottle of rum and turning it over in her magic, not opening it.

"You know, Luna, I was an awful pony. You might have tried to destroy Equestria, but that was only after I pushed you into doing it. I should have listened and stood by your side and demanded that we be treated as equals instead of..." She sighed.

"I guess it's too late for words, isn't it?" Celestia asked. "When you come back, will it be as my sister, or as the monster that she became? I don't think I could fight you either way."

She produced a scroll and scribbled a note on it, then tied it to the bottle with ribbon before making sure the cork was on tight enough.

"I hope when we see each other again, you'll remember that I've always loved you," Celestia whispered. She picked up the bottle and wrapped it in a magical bubble, then calculated the angle carefully and threw it so hard that the sound barrier shattered, the magical bubble keeping the bottle from doing the same.

It streaked off towards the stars. Or more precisely, towards the moon.

"Happy birthday, Luna," Celestia whispered.

"You spent your whole vacation on a beach?" Sunset asked. "I thought you'd do something really exotic, like visiting the sun or going to Elysium."

"Not the whole vacation," Celestia admitted. "I did a little boating, had some drinks in port, met some very nice ponies. Typical vacation stuff." She shrugged.

"I'm just glad you're back. You wouldn't believe the kind of things I've had to deal with," Cadance groaned. "The griffon ambassador wanted to go to war with Yakyakistan because their delegation ignored his missives."

"The Yaks ignore everyone," Celestia said.

"The griffons have decided that it's an act of war to ignore them."

Celestia sighed. "I'll start writing some letters. I wonder if it's too late to go back and just be a pirate..."

"Hm?" Sunset asked.

"Nothing."

Chapter 21

Hearts and Hooves Day was the happiest day of the year for new couples. And possibly the most depressing day of the year for ponies who found themselves involuntarily single.

There were only a few days to go, and Midnight Twinkle had not found a date. This was unfortunate, as she had told Princess Cadance that she had asked a colt out, and now she was expected to at least put in an appearance with him. That didn't mean that she didn't have a way out of this. She just had to be clever and consider all of her options.

"Okay, option one," Midnight said. "A combination of illusion or enchantment spells to make Mom and Pink Mom think I have a date with me. With the right suggestions and a good cover story, it could even work. Assuming either of them is even vulnerable to mind-affecting spells."

She bit her lip. That wasn't a sure thing. Princess Cadance was an alicorn. There were rumors going around that she was almost immune to normal spells, and if Midnight tried anything strong enough to put a dent in that, there was no way it would be stealthy.

"Option two," Midnight said. "Actually ask a colt out. That is by far the most dangerous option in the long term. What if we don't get along?" Midnight started pacing. "Or worse, what if we get along really well, get married far too young, and then I find out that he's actually more interested in bowling than hunting monsters?!"

She shook her head, balling up that paper and tossing it aside.

"That one's a last resort at best. But this third option..." Midnight scratched her chin. "Summoning a succubus. It would only have to pretend to be a pony for a little while. It would really be there, so I wouldn't have to worry about an enchantment failing to take effect. I might have to pay it, somehow, which might not be terribly pleasant. As long as it doesn't ask for my soul it could be worse."

She started tracing around the spell circle diagram she'd copied out of the Umbranomicon.

"What am I thinking?" Midnight huffed, throwing the paper away. "Even if the castle wards don't completely prevent demonic summoning, I'd be in like a million kinds of trouble if I tried summoning a demon again! Mom was so angry last time, and all I did was have Glorthex the Devourer do my math homework for me."

She sighed and picked a crumpled paper off of the ground. "I guess I'm gonna have to do this the hard way."

Twilight Sparkle had never thought about Hearts and Hooves Day except as one of the more annoying days on the calendar. It wasn't that she minded being alone – on the contrary, being around other ponies could be mentally and physically exhausting.

No, the problem was that it disrupted her schedule with a meaningless holiday that she didn't participate in. The Summer Sun Celebration was fun. Hearth's Warming was great! But what wasn't great was having ponies constantly remind her, intentionally or not, that she was fifteen and didn't have a date.

"I mean I'd go on a date if somepony asked," Twilight mumbled to herself, as she drew a straight line on some scrap paper, trying to busy herself by following the rather elaborate instructions Radian Edge had given for drawing an improved telekinesis spell rune.

"Twiwight?" Spike asked, from the other room. "Um... How much fire is too much fire?"

Twilight scrambled to her hooves, grabbing the bucket of water she always kept nearby. She couldn't wait for the week to be over and for ponies to go back to normal.

"Yeah, okay, so look," Midnight said, her wavy mane hanging loose around her head. "I need a date for the holiday, and I know this is sort of last minute, but as long as you aren't doing anything, maybe we could hang out?"

"Uh, well," Sunburst coughed. "I don't know, uh..." He wasn't sure which of the twins he was talking to. He wasn't even sure which would be worse.

"What, are you saying I'm not good enough?" Midnight frowned. Her hair started moving a little on its own, like a breeze was going through the school corridor.

"No, that's not it!" Sunburst said, quickly.

"Then what is it?" Midnight demanded. "If you've got a marefriend, just tell me. I won't hold it against you. I mean I admit this is last minute, so it's not all your fault."

Sunburst twitched at the presumption that any of this was his fault. "I used to have a marefriend but we sort of drifted apart after she sent me this crazy letter about cutie marks-"

"Great! That's in the past! I'm not crazy at all!" Midnight smiled. "I've even got certificates from experts that prove it! So just, uh, I don't know. Figure something out and get back to me."

She winked at him and walked away, quickly turning the corner so she could talk to herself.

"Hah! All it took was a little confidence and... three tries," Midnight looked at her checklist. "That's not bad at all. With a little more experimentation I can probably come up with a sure-fire way to get a date that anypony could manage. I mean, I could if I wanted to." She blushed, looking around. "One step at a time, Midnight."

Twilight frowned as she looked at her overstuffed saddlebags, then took everything out of them for the third time. She was sure she could fit everything in if she packed it optimally. The math said it had to be possible. Of course, the math also said that she shouldn't have been able to eat three hayburgers at once, but she'd won that bet.

"Maybe if I start with the largest book, then the smallest, then the second largest..." Twilight started sorting the books.

"Hey!" Sunburst said, from behind her. Twilight jumped and dropped the books, her neat piles spilling everywhere. "Woah. Sorry. Let me help you with that." He picked them up for her, putting them in her saddlebags. They fit the first time.

Twilight's eyebrow twitched.

"I was thinking," Sunburst said. "I guess I might have come off as a little rude before."

"Okay?" Twilight shrugged.

"I mean, I don't have a date for Hearts and Hooves Day, and I know what it's like. So I figure we can at least have a good time together. You'll be at the castle, right?"

Twilight blinked and nodded.

"Great! I've come up with some plans like you asked and we can meet at the Sugar Torus at noon." Sunburst smiled. "I'd tell you more, but I kind of want to keep it a secret. Oh and, uh, kinda keep it on the down-low. I've heard that ponies who try and date anypony Celestia has her eyes on kind of... end up getting scared away."

"...Right, secret," Twilight nodded, too surprised to do anything else.

"It's a date!" Sunburst bowed politely and left the room.

Twilight stood completely still for exactly three hundred and twenty four seconds, the exact amount of time it took for her brains to completely reboot after a crash so hard that she briefly saw her life flash before her eyes.

"I have a date," Twilight said, slowly. A smile started to appear on her lips. "I have a date!" She paled, the smile fading like the hopes of a prisoner being led out into the light only to see the noose. "Oh no. I have a date!"

Midnight lingered near Sunburst's locker. Not that she was nervous or anything. She was just coincidentally there even though her own locker was... well, technically she had a locker somewhere, but she'd never bothered using it. Extradimensional storage was just so much more convenient.

"Hey!" She said, very casually, when Sunburst came to get a few things. "So what time were you picking me up?" She saw confusion cross his face, and for a moment she felt paralyzing fear in her chest. Had he somehow forgotten her? Was she forgettable? Did he think she was joking?

"I thought I already told you," Sunburst said. "We can meet at the Sugar Torus at noon and go from there. That's okay, right?"

"Right, right," Midnight coughed. She made a quick note so she wouldn't forget. Had he mentioned it in passing and she'd missed it? She did miss things, sometimes. Especially when she was distracted by other things. "I'm just feeling scatterbrained. I misheard you last time and wanted to make sure."

"Oh, okay," Sunburst smiled. "Hey, did you do something with your mane?"

"Huh?" Midnight touched her long, wavy mane. "Oh, yeah. I started using different hair gel. Mom let me borrow some of hers. Turns out the stuff I had been using was flammable, which isn't a good combination with fire spells."

"You didn't get hurt, did you?" Sunburst asked, concerned.

"No, no." Midnight waved off his concern. "It wasn't a big deal. I had to lop off a few inches and use a hair growth spell to fix it. It's still a little messy. Maybe I should go to the stylist before the date..."

"I'm sure you'll look great either way," Sunburst said. "I'll see you later, okay? This is sort of last minute so I need to make sure everything's ready with the plans I made."

"Oh, right, of course," Midnight laughed. "I'll see you then."

She trotted off, smiling to herself. This was all going perfectly!

"You can't wear black on Hearts and Hooves Day," Cadance sighed. "It's not a festive color!"

"But I look good in black," Midnight said. "And it's my favorite color."

"There are plenty of other colors you'd look good in," Cadance said. "In fact, I think the best would be-"

"Pink," Midnight sighed. "You're going to say pink."

"I might have been about to suggest a different color," Cadance said, defensively. Midnight raised an eyebrow and looked at the pink pony princess, sitting on her pink bed, in her pink room, in a castle which was only painted white because Cadance wasn't in charge. Cadance sighed. "Okay, fine. I was going to say pink. But you've got a pink streak in your mane. It would work out just fine."

"We can compromise," Midnight said. "Black with pink ribbons."

"Well... pink and black do go together," Cadance admitted. "And a splash of color would help keep it from looking like you were going to a funeral."

Midnight picked out a black dress and tried it on.

"This one's a little tight." She started taking it off. Cadance stopped her.

"It's supposed to be tight, to show off your flank," Cadance said. "Trust me. You've got beautiful legs, so you want a tighter fit to show them off."

"I bet you say that to all the fillies," Midnight said.

"Midnight, please," Cadance huffed. "You know full well I also say it to all the colts. I am a very discriminating pony."

"I think you're the opposite of discriminating."

"Don't let your mother hear you say that," Cadance said. "Now, maybe we should put up your mane. I know you like leaving it loose, but on a date it's practical to keep it away from your face and neck."

"Why? To show off my excellent vertebrae?"

"No, so when your date comes in close for a kiss, he doesn't get a mouth full of your mane." Cadance put it up, tying it into a bun with bright pink ribbon laced around it. "There. Very refined."

"I guess," Midnight shrugged.

"And I think we need a little more, just in case. An extra layer. It adds mystery." Cadance picked through the clothing the maids had set out. "Ah, perfect." She pulled out a half-cape of black lace with pink hearts sewn into some of the panels like stained glass. She helped Midnight put it on, and it hung loosely, just to her knees, almost like a wide scarf or mantle.

"There. Now it's perfect," Cadance nodded. "An extra layer is always important so you have something to take off without losing your outfit completely. And since it has black and pink, it ties the outfit together."

"You planned the whole thing out in advance, didn't you?" Midnight asked.

"Maybe." Cadance smiled. "I might have had an outfit or two ready for my little Midnight's big first date."

Midnight sighed and blushed. "You're the best, Pink Mom."

"I'm not wearing black, Mom," Twilight rolled her eyes. "It's a date, not a funeral."

"Not a funeral unless you get home late," Twilight Velvet corrected. "If he doesn't have you back by ten, they'll never find the body."

"I don't even live at home anymore!" Twilight blushed. "I just came to pick up an outfit."

"And you're going to get one," Velvet smiled. "Did I ever tell you about how I met your father in a cafe in Roan?"

"Is this the story with the weird monsters again? Because there were a bunch of factual inconsistencies in your descriptions and I'm pretty sure I can prove they never actually happened. Plus when I asked Dad he says you met at school."

"Your father doesn't have a sense of adventure," Velvet huffed. "My story is much better, so it's true. Besides, he married me so he's obligated to agree that I'm always right."

"Except about this dress," Twilight said. "I was thinking about wearing pink instead."

"I suppose," Velvet sighed. "But pink is a rather strong color. It's really more appropriate for stallions. Maybe a soft cornflower blue."

"It's Hearts and Hooves Day, Mom. Pink and red! It's traditional! I have it on my checklist!" Twilight held up her scroll.

"Alright, alright," Velvet said, taking a step back. "I know better than to argue with a checklist. I lose every time."

"Exactly," Twilight nodded.

"I have just the thing," Velvet said, going to her closet and taking out a hanging dress. It was mostly pink silk, with an underlayer of white. A few sequins were sewn strategically around it, creating eye-catching sparkles without making themselves obvious.

"I've never seen this one before," Twilight said, tilting her head.

"I haven't worn it since Shining Armor was born. Back then I was in shape." She huffed. "I could probably still fit into it if I wanted, of course. I'm as healthy as a horse."

"We're all as healthy as horses. Where does that saying even come from?"

"Oh, is this a fact that I know and my little Twily doesn't?" Velvet smiled. "There was a plague in Zebrica that affected zebras but not ponies. Celestia sent some of our best doctors and nurses to help, and for a lot of zebras their first impression of a pony was that we were in perfect health even when everyone else was too sick to get out of bed."

"Interesting," Twilight muttered, filing the fact away in the vast library of trivia that filled her brain. "But this dress doesn't have any red. There needs to be red for it to be traditional."

"The red shows up when your date gets you home late or makes you cry," Velvet muttered.

"Mom!" Twilight huffed.

"Fine, fine. I'll get the jewelry box. I'm sure I have a few garnets you can borrow."

"Thanks, Mom." Twilight smiled.

The Sugar Torus had sprung up one day as a rival to the ancient institution known as Donut Joe's. Where Donut Joe's had survived unchanged for as long as anypony could remember (even Celestia wasn't really sure when it had been built – it just seemed to appear one day and have always been there), the Sugar Torus was a temple to the newest and best ways to turn flour and sugar into fried food.

The whole place was chrome and glass. Visible through the windows (very intentionally visible) was the assembly line. A newly patented donut-making machine took hoof-mixed dough in at one end, turned it into rings, then took them through a vat of sizzling oil before passing them through a waterfall of sugar glaze. Watching the donuts being made was almost half of the point of going to the Sugar Torus.

"Twilight Sparkle?" A very familiar voice called out. Twilight turned from watching the assembly line to look. Midnight walked towards her with the easy grace that Twilight envied, her flank swaying in a perfect sine wave. "I wasn't expecting to see you outside your room on Hearts and Hooves Day."

"I have a date," Twilight said, smugly. "A very nice stallion asked me out. Did you have to threaten somepony to meet you here, or did you just sneak them out of Tartarus when Cerberus wasn't looking?"

"Mm. The latter does sound like an exciting first date, but no. I did ask somepony out. He should be around soon." Midnight stepped up to the window to look. It was almost hypnotic, watching the donuts cook.

"Who is it?" Twilight asked, curious.

"You'll find out when he gets here," Midnight said. "What about you? Honestly, I'm surprised you decided to date a stallion. I just thought you preferred mares. You were always looking at Lyra's flank..."

Twilight blushed. "No I wasn't! You're just projecting because you were raised by a pervert."

"I can't argue with that," Midnight muttered. "I asked Cadance for dating advice once and she told me that I should play for both teams."

"Play for both teams?" Twilight tilted her head. "But that would probably be a violation of your contract with one or the other sides. And what if they have games scheduled on the same day?"

"Never mind," Midnight sighed. "Look, let's make a deal – I won't interfere with your date, you won't interfere with mine."

"Agreed," Twilight nodded. She raised her hoof and they shook on it.

"But for the record," Midnight whispered. "I did consider summoning a succubus, until I realized Cadance probably knows all of them on a first-name basis."

Twilight laughed quietly.

"Let's wait inside," Midnight suggested. "We can sit together until our dates show up, and we can see who got the better stallion."

"Okay," Twilight nodded, smiling.

Sunburst smiled to himself. Nothing could go wrong. He had a date with a mare, all his plans had come through, and the pegasi had made sure the weather was great today. There was a quick shower scheduled for later, but that was only to cool the day down and provide a nice buildup to some kind of special surprise (probably the same surprise they had every year - a rainbow made custom-order in pinks and purples).

He'd picked the Sugar Torus because he knew they did a good lunch there. He wasn't sure if a haybacon hayburger with glazed donuts for a bun was exactly date food, but it sure wasn't every day food, so it was as good of an excuse as any.

Two tickets to a jazz theatre had been easy to get, and jazz was sophisticated enough that even a high-class pony couldn't argue, while being casual enough that they could still relax. It was something his roommate, a cute colt – wait no, nice, not cute (he was a colt, after all) – named Stardust.

Stardust had even been nice enough to take him there and pay for dinner, just so he could see what it was like and make sure he'd be comfortable. It had been a really great time, though of course it hadn't been a date, because Stardust had been a colt.

Sunburst adjusted his tie and opened the door. Nothing was going to go wrong today. As long as he kept repeating that, it would come true.

He walked in and heard a voice call out for him. No, two voices. He turned, and saw two, identical, fillies standing up and waving. For a brief moment. Then they turned to each other and glared.

That was when Sunburst knew he was going to die.

"What are you doing?" Twilight demanded. "That's my date."

"No, he's my date!" Midnight said. "I asked him out!"

"But he asked me out!" Twilight said. The two fillies, who were essentially identical to a casual glance, glared at each other for a long moment.

"I'm not going to just let you steal away my date," Midnight said, firmly.

"Since he asked me out, it means he only accepted because he thought you were me," Twilight retorted. "Besides, why would he want to date a copy when he can date the original?"

"Oh that's it," Midnight huffed. "No one calls me a copy!"

The air filled with the hum of magic. Most ponies in Canterlot were unicorns, largely because there was no room for urban sprawl and the ponies who owned the land had owned it for so long that the original copies of the deeds were written in Horse Latin.

Because of this long history of magically talented and sensitive individuals, there were all sorts of formal and informal rules about using magic in public. Using powerful spells in public was a lot like shouting - other unicorns could feel it even from rather far away, it was distracting, and it could be a bit rude. Of course, shouting in public was perfectly acceptable in certain situations, such as when entertaining others with a performance or when one's life was in danger.

To put it into terms that anypony could understand, the amount of magic welling up from Midnight and Twilight was like ponies shouting with the force and volume of a jet engine-powered chainsaw. It was dangerous in every way that could be imagined.

Even the non-unicorns quickly realized something was wrong when the building started vibrating.

"I guess there's only one way to settle this," Midnight said, narrowing her eyes.

"I guess so," Twilight agreed.

One of the more formal sets of rules that had been developed in Canterlot regarded magical dueling. The rules for dueling were intricate and designed both to protect the ponies involved and everyone around them. Without restraint, a powerful unicorn could accidentally cause a huge amount of property damage.

The problem was, neither Midnight nor Twilight had ever actually learned the rules for magical dueling.

There had, of course, been plenty of cases where two powerful unicorns had fought each other without rules. Most of the time, this resulted in maps being changed to reflect a new crater where a town had previously been.

Twilight started charging up a spell. Midnight did the same. The smartest ponies in the building were the first ones out of the door, the rest following.

With a shared magical pool, the question of endurance wasn't one that would factor into the equation. Both of them would run out of magic at the same time. Therefore, the winner would be determined by the pony who was able to grab and use as much of that magic as possible in the time before it was exhausted.

Midnight threw a target-seeking bouncing-betty fireball at Twilight.

Twilight's spell came a fraction of a second later, a wave of cracking energy that sublimated solids directly into gas.

The spells collided, and what would have been a massive, earth-shattering explosion got sucked sideways by the one force neither Twilight or Midnight would have expected.

The donut machine.

Right under the 'Flim-Flam Industries Patent Pending Donut Maker 2000' label was a siphon that collected magic. Both spells, along with the majority of magic that Twilight and Midnight had available at the moment, got sucked into the machine and vanished.

"What?" Twilight blinked.

"Uh," Midnight frowned. "What happened to my spell? The building shouldn't even be here."

"Thankfully, it failed," Twilight said. "I can't believe you'd cast something so reckless."

"And you think your spell was any better?" Midnight asked.

"It wouldn't cause collateral damage," Twilight retorted.

"It was a disintegration wave!" Midnight yelled.

"A very clean one," Twilight replied.

A red light started blinking on the donut machine, and an alarm sounded, blaring in time with the flashing light. Somewhere inside the complicated thaumechanical device, white lights flashed, and steam started pouring from an unseen source. A sound like pressure building in a boiler started rising in volume, the donut machine itself shaking. The donuts coming out of it started becoming more and more irregular.

"I think we should leave," Midnight whispered, backing towards the door.

"Uh. Yes. Leaving." Twilight agreed with her rival, backing up with her and unable to take her eyes from the machine. It sounded a lot like the wailing of the imprisoned daemons in Tartarus. "I think that large input of magic might have damaged the mechanism."

"No kidding," Midnight said, as she took cover just outside the door. Twilight did a quick scan and paled, then started running.

"Where are you going?" Midnight yelled, as Twilight ran past her and across the street.

"It's gonna be big!" Twilight screamed.

"How big?" Midnight asked, following her. When a mage was running from something magical, a wise pony did their best to keep up.

"Big!" Twilight said, her eyes wide.

The windows of the Sugar Torus blew out, and the inside was filled with flickering white light. Midnight looked back just as the roof started peeling away, falling into the sky as if gravity had been reversed. Swirls of unrestrained magical energy wisped into the sky.

"We're going to get in so much trouble," Midnight hissed.

Celestia sipped at her tea. She hadn't spent Hearts and Hooves Day with anypony in so long that many of her subjects thought she was a virgin. The rest of them thought that her Royal Guard was secretly a harem.

The truth, as in most things, was somewhere in-between.

The tea came back to Celestia's lips, and the ground shook under her. Her expression froze in a familiar placid mask, and her ears perked up as she listened, weaving a few spells to try and subtly detect what was happening. It was entirely possible the castle was merely settling - the foundations had seen heavy work after Twilight and Midnight had both had magical surges seven years ago.

"Princess!" Raven, one of her attendants, ran into the room. "There's some kind of giant pillar of light coming out of the city!"

"Ah," Celestia sighed. "It's one of those days, then." She stood up and walked with Raven towards a room with a view of the disaster.

"Princess, do you know what's going on?" A few other ponies were already there, on the edge of panic.

"Interesting," Celestia said. She sat down to watch.

"Aren't you going to do something about that?" One of the nobles asked.

"I'm going to see how this one plays out," Celestia said.

"This isn't my fault!" Twilight said. "The donut machine was clearly very poorly designed! If it had been designed with the proper safeguards, it would have failed by dumping its magical store into some kind of stable grounding material like a flawless diamond!"

"It was a donut shop, Twilight! They can't afford diamonds as big as your stupid head!" Midnight snapped.

"It's still a bad design!" Twilight yelled.

Midnight pulled Twilight into cover behind a newspaper stand.

"Okay, look, we need to fix this," Midnight said. "We fix this, we at least get in less trouble than we otherwise would. Right?"

"Right," Twilight agreed. She peeked out at the white light. "I think that's a class-three cross dimensional tear."

"Any idea what's on the other side?"

"The other side," Twilight said.

"Yes, thank you," Midnight rolled her eyes.

"No, I mean... the other side."

"Oh," Midnight said. "That's... really bad. I think it counts as necromancy."

"It will definitely lower property values," Twilight noted. "But at least it's not a portal to the Abyss or Pandemonium."

"I think the building is actually keeping it contained."

"It's the chrome," Twilight said. "It can be used as a substitute for silver for a lot of binding rituals. But it isn't a perfect circle, so it won't last that long."

"...We'll have to use Star Swirl's Banishing Gate," Midnight decided.

"That's a tenth-circle spell," Twilight said. "Neither of us can cast that!"

"Each of us will cast half of it!" Midnight said. "Then it's only like... a fifth-circle spell! That sublimation spell you cast was at least sixth or seventh, so it should be easy to manage!"

"Two unicorns can't just cast half a spell each and expect it to work," Twilight said. "The magic won't create a complete circuit. We'll just have two unstable, half-broken spells that will blow up in our faces or make things worse!"

"Two normal unicorns can't," Midnight agreed. "But we're not normal. We've got the same cutie mark and the same magical pool. Our spell should be able to come together on its own. It's like how the Princess told us that we were stronger when we worked together!"

"I–I have absolutely no idea if it'll work or not," Twilight said. "It's risky and stupid."

"Just like me! But it's also an experiment, and requires precision so we get it right the first try."

"And that's what I'm good at," Twilight muttered.

"So how about it? Willing to give it a try?" Midnight asked.

"Fine, but if anything goes wrong, I'm throwing you into it," Twilight said, standing up. "How do we divide up the spell?"

"You start from the master rune and go clockwise. I'll go counterclockwise. We should meet around the middle."

"Okay. We should be on opposite sides of the building to maximize the chance that this spell actually does what we want."

"That means we'll have to cast without seeing how the other is doing," Midnight noted.

"Right, so there's a timing issue," Twilight noted. "If we had watches..."

"Which we don't. And we can't just do a silent count. My casting is faster than yours."

"It's only faster when you're using a familiar spell."

"Says you," Midnight stuck out her tongue.

"We'll have to use something else..." Twilight looked up. "Okay. That tower. The top should be visible on both sides of the Sugar Torus. We'll each cast a shifting lights spell on it. Green when we're in position, changing to yellow when we're ready to cast and then red with a ten-second countdown when we start casting."

"Great, only a million ways this could go wrong," Midnight sighed. "What do you figure our chances of success are?"

"What was your grade in Calculus?"

"I got a 'B'."

"Then you couldn't understand the number." Twilight's ears folded back as the wailing increased in pitch. "And it's getting worse by the minute! We need to hurry!"

The two young mares ran to opposite sides of the Sugar Torus, which was starting to collapse and deform, the chrome bubbling and blackening. Twilight looked up at the tower, a green light popping into place. She put her own light up and shifted it to yellow after bracing herself.

Midnight's light went right from green to red. Twilight gasped and started casting, throwing the runes together. She should have known that Midnight would throw caution to the wind.

She could feel it. The spell. Both halves of it. It was just like the first time they'd really connected, when they'd flared and gotten their cutie marks at the same time. The magic connected them, like they were two trees growing from the same roots.

The spell came together easily. Midnight pushed Twilight along to complete the circle before it could collapse, and at the same time Twilight felt herself correcting the minor mistakes Midnight had made putting her half together. It wasn't like two ponies working together, but like one pony being able to focus on two things at once.

Midnight blinked as the moment ended, the spell erupting into being. A rift formed around the Sugar Torus like a seam coming undone in the fabric of the world, and the donut shop dropped through into a sea of alien stars before the gate sealed itself again.

Midnight looked across the now-empty lot at Twilight.

"We did it!" Twilight yelled, happily. They ran towards each other and embraced and, just for a moment, both of them remembered the unity they'd shared.

"Uh... wanna hit up Donut Joe's?" Midnight asked, blushing and pulling away. "I don't have anything else to do today now that my date's gone."

"Where did he run off to, anyway?" Twilight asked.

Sunburst was in a dark place. Not as dark as where the Sugar Torus had gone, but certainly a lot smaller, smellier, and made of cheap sheet metal. That is to say, he'd taken refuge in a garbage can.

"I'm never going out with a mare ever again," he swore. "They're all insane!"

"So there you are," Sunset said, as she walked into Donut Joe's. Midnight and Twilight looked up from the booth they were sharing.

"Oh, uh, hi Mom," Midnight blushed.

"You're in a lot of trouble," Sunset said, sternly. "Do you have any idea how much property damage you caused?"

"It wasn't her fault!" Twilight said. "It was a malfunctioning donut machine! And also my fault. But mostly the donut machine!"

"An entire building is gone! Vanished! X-zoned!" Sunset said. "Do you know how hard it is to fill out paperwork for the insurance on that? They don't like to hear that the business was sent into another dimension!"

"Sunset, shhh!" Cadance whispered, as she stepped around her, an expression on her face like a predatory cat. "That's not important."

"Cadance—"

"It's Hearts and Hooves Day, which is officially unofficially my personal holiday," Cadance said. "So I get to decide what's important."

"Millions of bits—"

"Not as important as this. Look!" Cadance grinned. "Twilight and Midnight! Midnight and Twilight! On a date!"

"W-what?!" Midnight sputtered.

"We're not on a date," Twilight said.

"We're not," Midnight agreed. "We had a date. Each of us had a date. Dates that weren't each other. But after the accident, they ran off."

"And then we came here for coffee and donuts," Twilight added. "Because it's been a long day and it's only like two in the afternoon."

"Of course," Cadance smiled, coming closer and slinking lower until she was eye-level with the surface of the table and looking up at Twilight and Midnight. "Then you won't mind if Sunset and I make it a double date?"

"If that's what you really want to call it," Midnight sighed.

Cadance and Sunset got into the booth, the two lavender unicorns moving over to make room, ending up sitting quite close to one another.

"So, explain to me," Sunset said. "How exactly a donut machine caused the biggest cross-dimensional rift in centuries."

"Well, it kind of started with a colt..." Midnight started.

Chapter 22

Mondays were the most difficult day of the week. And true to her name, Twilight was not a morning pony. Therefore, Monday morning was always a difficult trial. The worst part was that she had no one to blame but herself. She'd studied long into the night on Sunday, because something had caught her interest, and so she'd gotten very nearly four hours of sleep.

"Maybe I should set two alarms. One to make me go to sleep, and another to make me wake up." She groaned as she walked across a cold stone floor to the bathroom.

A hot shower would make her feel better. She slid under the water once it had warmed, letting it spray across her for a few minutes before grabbing her bottle of shampoo and working it into her hair.

It took almost a minute before she realized something was wrong. There was no smell of flowers or honey, her hair was getting sticky instead of clean, and, in fact, the only thing Twilight could smell was...

"Mayonnaise?!" Twilight hissed, looking at the bottle. She squeezed a little more out and looked at it, confirming what she'd sensed. "But why is there mayonnaise in my---"

She stopped, and her expression fixed into a scowl as she realized exactly what had happened. It wasn't like shampoo could turn itself into a condiment on its own, and the bottle couldn't spontaneously change. As her brother had taught her, sometimes the only sane answer was that you were the victim of enemy action.

"Midnight," Twilight growled. "She pranked me!"

Twilight threw the bottle across the room and started scrubbing, trying to get the disgusting stuff out of her mane. It wasn't the first time that she'd been pranked by Midnight, but it would be the last.

"I'll get my revenge on you," Twilight muttered. "Just wait!"

"Rather unusual weather we're having," Cadance commented, looking at the brown cloud that was hovering outside of the balcony. She'd gathered there with Sunset and Celestia after they'd seen it slowly circling the castle grounds.

"It's made of chocolate milk," Sunset said. "Cadance, you were a weather pony -- think it could be done with pegasus magic?"

"You'd need a hundred gallons of milk to even try," Cadance said. "And even then I don't know if it would work. Especially with the chocolate. When I made clouds from salt water, the salt didn't come with it. Only fresh water would come back out."

"It's unnatural," Celestia said. "I've seen something like this before. The cloud is only holding together through magic. Specifically chaos magic."

"Chaos magic?" Sunset blinked. "Who would be stupid enough to try playing around with that?"

Two sets of eyes stared at her. Sunset blushed.

"Well I didn't do it, so who else is stupid enough to try playing around with it?" Sunset huffed. "I swear. Spend a little while researching dark magic and you never live it down."

"Speaking of down, I think it's starting to rain." Cadance said. "The, um, chocolate milk cloud, I mean."

"Well that's good, at least," Sunset said. "Maybe it'll dissipate on its own."

"It's raining chocolate syrup," Cadance said.

"We should find Midnight," Celestia sighed. "It was either her or Twilight Sparkle." Celestia paused. "And if we find them together, and they're arguing over whose fault it is, it was both of them."

"Fifty bits on both of them," Sunset whispered.

"I don't take sucker bets," Cadance whispered back.

"It wasn't me!" Midnight yelled, annoyed. "I swear on... on things that matter when you swear on them!" She kicked her saddlebags across the room in frustration. Sunset closed the door behind them so they could talk, ignoring the oddly monochromatic maids outside for the moment.

"Somepony had to used chaos magic," Sunset said. "There are about three ponies in the world who know enough to actually try using it, two of us stupid enough to try, and only one of those doesn't have an alibi."

"Making out with Cadance shouldn't be an alibi," Midnight said. "Mom, I really didn't do it."

"If you didn't, we'll find out who did," Sunset assured her. "Until then, you're grounded. For putting mayo in Twilight's shampoo, if nothing else."

"That wasn't me either," Midnight muttered.

"See, that one I don't believe," Sunset said. "You two have been pranking each other for as long as you've both been in the castle. There's literally nopony else who would have done that."

"Well if I'd thought of it, I would have pranked her that way," Midnight admitted. "But I didn't. I'd take credit for it if it was me."

"That's fair," Sunset nodded. "But Twilight is looking for payback. Maybe you should think of this as protective custody. I'm pretty sure she'd love to get revenge on you."

"Revenge for what?" Midnight pouted and fell back on her bed. "I'm innocent! She probably made up the whole thing to get me in trouble! She pranks herself, then she's free to do anything to me!"

"Midnight, she was very upset," Sunset said. "Who else would even want to prank her?"

"Cadance," Midnight said, instantly. "Maybe Celestia. She always teases ponies when she knows they can't prove anything. Some of the castle staff. Lemon Hearts-"

"Who?"

"The one who got her head stuck in the flask."

"Oh, her," Sunset frowned. "How did she even do that?"

"Long story," Midnight shrugged. "But she'd totally be up for a prank war."

"Well don't let it turn into one," Sunset said, firmly. "I just know things would get out of hand and one of you would end up blowing up Canterlot and screaming something like 'they called me mad! Now who's insane?!'"

"That wouldn't happen," Midnight said.

"It totally would. I bet you'd even do an evil laugh."

"Ugh. Just go away and let me be grounded in peace," Midnight said. "I might as well do the homework Celestia assigned me since I can't do anything fun."

"Just remember to ask if you need anything," Sunset said.

"Yeah, yeah," Midnight sighed, opening a book and instantly becoming bored with it.

She held the pose, turning pages blankly, until Sunset had left. She gave it a few more minutes to be sure she was alone, then locked the door and started making preparations. She only had one chance to get this right without setting off all sorts of alarms in the castle, and she intended to make it worth the effort.

Twilight hummed happily to herself as she brought another stack of books back to her room. Half were borrowed, half would have permanent spots in her library thanks to the generous educational stipend she got every month (and promptly spent within days on new texts).

"First I'll shelve the new books, then I'll read the library books," she said to herself. After all, the library books had a time limit on them. She sorted her burden into two piles, then picked up her new copy of De Historia Piscium Equuis - which she had largely gotten for its historical value as everypony knew that 'Piscium Equuis', commonly translated as Sea Ponies, did not in fact exist (everypony was wrong about that, but it had not saved the publishing house that had gone out of business after the book failed).

Her eyes went to the third shelf on her bookcase, where she had all of her books about mythological creatures, and found that she was in fact looking at a copy of Principa Magika.

"How did you get there?" Twilight asked, tilting her head and taking the book off of the shelf.. "I must have been really tired when I shelved you-" she noticed the book next to it. Daring Do and the Space Reptoids.

"But that should be on the bottom shelf!" Twilight said, annoyed. She took that off of the shelf as well. Then the one next to it. And the one next to that. Every single book was misshelved!

"Midnight!" Twilight yelled, shaking her hoof at the sky.

"...and that's why you should never, ever, use chaos magic," Celestia finished, as she drew a rough diagram. "Because no runes or mystic circles are used, the magic takes its own path in the aether. It's fast, messy, and even tiny changes to initial conditions can have huge differences in the outcome."

"Doesn't it still roughly follow intent?" Midnight asked, as she took notes. The pot of ink seemed a little odd today, somewhat too runny. She'd have to get a new one soon -- this was either poorly mixed or just too old.

"Yes, but think of it this way," Celestia said. "Here I have my tea, and it's gone cold. If I use chaos magic with the intent of making it better to drink, it might warm it, change the flavor, or just turn it into something else entirely, and I'd have no idea which until it was over."

"Then why would anypony use chaos magic?" Twilight asked, sitting back. "Something with that many hidden variables is just worthless if you want to be able to repeat results."

"The main attraction is that you can get results that do not correspond to a spell you know," Celestia explained. "A pony who doesn't know how to cast a spell to warm their tea might find themselves tempted to use chaos magic to accomplish the feat."

"But they'd be rolling the dice with the actual results," Midnight said.

"It tends to cause a considerable amount of collateral damage," Celestia added. "The effects of chaos magic are often subtle or hidden until the worst possible moment, and then the ill-informed caster attempts it again and again, compounding the damage."

"Hmm..." Midnight sketched out the diagram in her notes, then flipped back to the first page she'd jotted down, only to find it blank. She frowned and looked through her papers, trying to figure out where she'd misplaced it.

"Is something wrong?" Celestia asked, as she watched Midnight.

"No, I just---" She looked back at the page of notes she'd just taken and watched as the ink faded into invisibility right before her eyes. "What? Where are my notes?!"

Celestia stepped over and picked up the ink pot, sniffing gently.

"Ah. An old classic. Disappearing ink." Celestia looked at Twilight, who was doing her best to look surprised and innocent. "I believe if you expose it to direct heat, like a candle flame, the writing reappears. I'll get you another pot of ink."

"Right," Midnight sighed. "Thank you, Princess."

Celestia left the room, and Midnight turned to look at Twilight.

"What?" Twilight asked. Midnight's glare didn't abate. "Fine. Yes, it was me. Consider it justifiable revenge for rearranging my bookcase!"

"Well maybe I wouldn't rearrange it if somepony hadn't framed me by pranking herself!" Midnight snapped.

"I didn't prank myself!" Twilight hissed. "Do you know what hot mayonnaise smells like?! It took an hour to wash the smell out!"

"Well it wasn't me," Midnight said. "I'd probably use mane dye instead. Harmony knows I've got a bunch that I've tried using. Every other color makes me look stupid."

"Why would you want to dye your mane?"

"Why would I-" Midnight huffed. "Because I don't want to look like you! Half of the maids can't even tell us apart even when I'm wearing glasses and have my mane grown out. Watch." She stood up and motioned for Twilight to follow her.

They stepped into the hallway. As usual, there were a few ponies milling around. Midnight walked up to one of the maids.

"Excuse me, Miss..." Midnight didn't recognize her. She looked almost like Feather Duster, if Feather Duster was covered in enough dust to turn her coat grey.

The maid turned and looked down at them, not saying anything. Her expression was oddly blank.

"Which one of us is Twilight Sparkle?" Midnight asked. Motioning between herself and Twilight.

The maid tilted her head.

"It's one of us," Midnight specified, waiting for an answer. "Only two ponies here. Fifty-fifty shot even if you don't have a clue."

The odd maid turned around and went back to what she was doing. Which was, apparently, slowly shredding papers and dropping the mess onto the floor.

"Okay, never mind," Midnight said, backing away. She leaned closer to Twilight. "I think she might be sick."

"Let's just wait for Celestia," Twilight sighed. "She should be back soon."

"I've got a better idea," Midnight smiled.

"Does something seem off to you?" Cadance asked, as she sat on her pillow. She'd been watching Sunset go over the usual pile of missives to the crown -- apparently doing Celestia's paperwork was her job when she wasn't doing the rest of the Princess' work for her -- and she'd gotten distracted by a raw feeling, like a distant toothache.

"Yes," Sunset said. She signed another scroll and set it aside into one of the piles in front of her.

"Really?" Cadance asked, looking up.

"I've been struggling to remember when I agreed to do this as a full-time job," Sunset said. "I'd almost rather be trying to find Bighoof and the Abominable Snowpony."

"Only almost?" Cadance smiled a little.

"Well, I wouldn't get to spend as much time with you, and the food's better than Guard rations," Sunset smirked. "So, mostly the food."

"I'm wounded," Cadance giggled. "But really, it feels like something's wrong. Have you ever seen a wild storm?"

"Sure," Sunset nodded. "Lots of them. My work took me to the edges of Equestria. There are a lot of places were where just aren't enough pegasi to run a weather team, and they end up with crazy storms. There was this one island I was at when I was hunting sirens -- apparently, every year it got hit with typhoons, and I had no idea one was coming until I was stuck there with no shelter or ride back home."

"You remember what it felt like before the storm came?" Cadance asked. "There's this... calm. Not a restful one. Like a sense of anticipation, and you can smell the rain in the air."

"I remember." Sunset stopped writing, looking at Cadance for the first time. "You feel that now?"

"No, it's just... something similar. There's something wrong. I don't know." Cadance bit her lip. "I can feel love, and it feels... muted today. Like grey clouds pulled over a blue sky."

"So... there's less love around?"

"Yes!" Cadance said, standing up. "And it can't be natural. It doesn't feel like Prisma, or her magic, but there's that same feeling of..."

"Disharmony," Celestia said, as the doors parted to admit her. "Chaos."

"I guess that's right," Cadance said. "I might have gone with 'unhappiness' or 'depression' but Disharmony really has a ring to it."

"What?" Celestia blinked. "I'm sorry, was I interrupting a conversation? I was trying to burst into the room dramatically."

"So what's all this about disharmony and chaos?" Sunset asked. "Unless- you left Midnight and Twilight alone. What did they do?"

"They've been following me, and they think I haven't noticed," Celestia said. "But this is more important than that."

"Why were you trying to burst into the room dramatically?" Cadance asked.

"I just thought..." Celestia looked embarrassed. "I very rarely get to make dramatic proclamations. We haven't had a proper national crisis in decades."

"And we're having one now?" Sunset asked, looking at her paperwork and wondering just how much paperwork she was about to have dropped in her lap.

"I fear so. Come with me," Celestia said. She paused. "And grab Twilight and Midnight from where they're hiding behind the curtains. They should come as well."

"It's a statue garden," Sunset said.

"I remember this," Twilight said. "We had to clean all the statues after we accidentally brought some of them to life. The groundskeeper was so mad."

"Well, 'a Pony descending the stairs' was his favorite statue," Celestia noted, absent-mindedly. "And it never was in quite the same pose after coming to life, even after the spell wore off."

"My bad," Midnight muttered.

"When you brought the statues to life all those years ago, there was only one thing that I was worried about," Celestia said. "You see, not all of these statues are merely pieces of art."

"Are they golems that are designed to protect Equestria?" Twilight asked.

"Nothing so fanciful," Celestia said. "No, some of them are criminals."

"Criminal statutes?" Cadance asked.

"I guess they're not subject to the statute of limitations," Sunset quipped.

"There have been, over the years, a few foes that could not be safely banished, or imprisoned in any normal way. For those beings... I was forced to use petrification," Celestia said. "Most of them are of relatively little threat even if revived now, but one of them was so dangerous that I fear I may no longer have the means to stop him."

"Who could be that dangerous?" Midnight asked. "Nightmare Moon?"

"Nightmare Moon isn't even real." Twilight rolled her eyes.

"Nightmare Moon is imprisoned on the moon," Celestia said, ignoring Twilight's gasp of surprise. "She will be released someday. Perhaps even someday soon. But no, I do not fear her. She is my equal." Celestia looked down. "The enemy I am concerned about was able to defeat all of my magic without even trying."

"Who was it?" Midnight asked.

"Discord," Celestia whispered, as she turned the corner and found an empty plinth. "It's worse than I feared. I thought the wards might merely be weak, but he has escaped entirely."

"On a scale of one to ten, how bad is this?" Sunset asked.

"Ah, I'm sorry, Sunset, I'm a bit distracted by feelings of existential terror," Celestia said. "I'm hoping he isn't so upset by his imprisonment that he decides to simply unmake the world."

"Ten it is," Sunset said. "But you beat him once before, so we'll just so that again. Beating him. However you did it. Can't be that hard, you're still here and so is the world."

"It's not that simple," Celestia said, quietly. "It isn't even in history books now. I don't know where he came from - I was just a filly at the time he showed up, and back then news and information traveled only as quickly as a pony could walk."

Celestia walked up to the empty pedestal and picked up a fragment of stone with her magic.

"I met him in the forest, when I was practicing my magic..."

Tia tried to focus, crossing her eyes and sticking out her tongue as the boulder in front of her stubbornly refused to move.

"Come on, you stupid thing!" Tia muttered. "If I can move you, then Dad will have to let me help out on the rock farm!" She strained, her horn sputtering as the rock started to shift. The moment her concentration faltered, it settled back into place.
Frustrated, Tia spun and kicked it.

"Ow!" Tia yelped. "Ow ow ow! Stupid rock! Dad will never let me help if I can't work the fields! At least Luna can move rainclouds and stuff. All I can do is help mom in the kitchen."

"Why are you having so much trouble with it?" Asked a voice from all around her. Tia backed up into a tree, scared. "It's just a rock."

"I--it's heavy," she said, trying to find the source of the voice. "Where are you? Who are you?"

"So make it lighter," suggested the voice.

"I'm already trying to levitate it!" Tia yelled.

"Yes, you're trying to lift it," the voice agreed. "But lifting something doesn't make it weigh less, it just gets it off the ground. It would be a lot easier to move it if it wasn't so heavy."

There was a flash and the boulder started glowing.

"Whoops," said the voice, annoyed. "That just made it better lighted."

Another flash, and the boulder's color shifted to a pale grey.

"And that's the wrong type of lighter. Getting closer."

A third flash, and it rose up into the air slowly, like a half-deflated balloon.

"Aha! Did it!" The voice sounded pleased with itself.

"How are you doing that?" Tia asked, approaching the boulder and gently touching it with a hoof. It was still as solid as ever.

"Magic, of course."

"Can I see you? Where are you? I've never met another unicorn." Tia circled the floating rock.

"I'm not a unicorn," the voice said.

"Oh. Well, what's your name?" Tia asked.

"I'm not sure I have one. How do you get a name?"

"Your parents give it to you."

"Oh. I don't have parents."

There was a flash of light on top of the boulder, a tiny patchwork creature only as big as her little sister uncurling like a cat. He was all mismatched parts and bits of things that didn't go together, like a rag doll.

"You're funny looking," Tia smiled. "Do you wanna be my friend?"

"...For a while, we were almost inseparable. Occasionally literally, when taffy or tree sap was involved." She smiled a little. "But things changed."

"Things don't just change," Sunset said. "What happened?"

"I grew up. So did he."

"You can't just play with them like puppets," Tia said, annoyed. "They're ponies. Do you know how much it scares them?"

"I didn't hurt them," Discord said, grumpily. He had grown far faster than Tia, big enough now that he was more like a dragon than the cute thing she'd found in the woods. "I was just having fun."

"Giving Mister Green's barn giant chicken legs and making it run away wasn't fun for him," Tia sighed.

"I fixed it," Discord retorted.

"You just removed the legs and left it in the Pears' orchard," Tia corrected. "That's not fixing it, that just creates more problems."

"A walking barn was a great idea. He could have trained it to follow him so he could avoid all that tedious walking to and from it," Discord said, angry. "It's not my fault that he doesn't understand my genius."

"His powers kept growing, and his self-control kept shrinking," Tia said. "When things came to a head he... did some things that I don't want to speak of. Suffice it to say that when it was over, the entire world paid the price. He was the ruler of Equestria, and he played with it like a bored child. Ponies learned not to stay in large groups, because they interested him more than lone ponies. Civilization crumbled."

"That bad?" Cadance whispered.

"That bad," Celestia said. "In the end, after everypony else had failed, my sister and I were able to seal him in stone with the Elements of Harmony, powerful magical artifacts."

"Well, that's great, then," Sunset said. "We just need to grab the Elements of whatever, then blast him with them again."

"It's not that easy," Celestia said.

"Sure it is," Sunset said, smiling. "We've got two alicorns and three of the strongest unicorns on the planet. If we work together, we can do anything."

"No, Sunset," Celestia said. She tugged the group closer with her magic and wrapped her wings around them in a tight hug. "I won't let you risk yourselves. I love you all too much to send you into battle against a foe you cannot defeat."

"Do you really have to do this in public?" Sunset blushed. "Ponies are watching."

"This section of the gardens is---" Celestia was about to say restricted until she actually looked around. There were dozens of eyes staring at them from grey ponies with dull expressions that ranged from unfocused anger to abject depression.

"I think we should leave," Cadance said. Celestia nodded and stepped between them and the crowd, ushering them towards the nearest doors back into the castle.

"What's happening to them?" Midnight asked, looking back at the mob.

"They look all... drained," Twilight added.

"It's Discord's influence," Celestia said. "He twists ponies to make them more... interesting to him." She pulled the door open and ushered them inside before closing it tightly and locking it. "Unfortunately, his idea of interesting is anarchy and unhappiness."

She walked past them, opening a hidden door in the wall.

"This way. I might not have quite as many hidden secrets as in my old castle, but a few shortcuts prove useful from time to time."

Twilight and Midnight looked around the revealed, windowless corridor. It was granite and stone, with a fine layer of dust that maids would never have allowed. Only a few lights here and there provided any illumination.

"Where are we?" Twilight asked.

"I think this is actually inside the outer wall." Sunset pointed to the next light. "See where it kind of bends inward there? That must be following the line of the tower."

"This space is slightly compressed," Celestia said. "It wouldn't fit otherwise. It's a bit of a cheat. There are a few rooms in the castle that do the same thing, and a loose spatial flexure that pops up from time to time in the east hallways."

"Wait, is that why I keep getting lost when I'm trying to find the sitting room?" Twilight frowned.

"No, that's because you try to read and walk at the same time," Midnight retorted.

"Here we are," Celestia said, opening another hidden door and leading the group out into a hallway. "This part of the castle should be relatively secure. It's near the heart of the wardings."

They trotted out into a hallway lit on both sides by light streaming through stained glass.

"Hey, this one has Princess Celestia," Midnight said, stopping in front of one of the windows.

"Is the other pony Nightmare Moon?" Twilight asked, looking at her mentor.

"Yes," Celestia said, her voice strained. She didn't look at the window. "It's a monument to better times."

"Speaking as a monument to better times, Luna was always a bit dull compared to Tia," chuckled a voice that seemed to resonate from the walls around them.

"Discord!" Celestia hissed.

A shape snaked through the stained glass, the frame warping like water to let the image move.

"In the flesh," Discord said. He looked at himself. "Or not, I suppose."

Sunset Shimmer had trained herself to react instantly to any threat. The moment Discord seemed distracted, she blasted the stained glass with a Shatter spell, the window turning into a rain of rainbow-colored glass shards.

"That wasn't very nice," Discord said, his voice coming from nowhere. There was a flash of light, Sunset vanished from where she'd been standing, and the window showed an animated Sunset Shimmer instead of Discord.

"Sunset!" Cadance yelled. She ran over to the window. Sunset looked down at her, confused.

Discord appeared on the ceiling, wearing a beret and paining random lines on a canvas, no two the same color. "Now, maybe we can have a nice chat, or perhaps I need to get creative. I could turn one of you into a painting or a book. Then again the little nerd here might like it." He held up a claw and a purple book with a star cutie mark appeared on it. "Of course, I might need to make a volume one and two." He turned his head upside-down and looked between Twilight and Midnight. "Very interesting. And here I thought you swore off the mirror pool after you tried ruling alongside yourself when Lulu tragically left us."

"I- how did you know about that?" Celestia hissed.

"Oh please," Discord snorted. "It wasn't like I couldn't tell what was going on around me." He snapped his talons and reappeared on the floor.

"Discord, I warn you, you'll stop hurting my little ponies or else---"

"Or else what?" Discord asked, curious. It didn't even sound a little bit like a threat. "No, really. What will you do? You can't use the Elements of Harmony. Your sister isn't here to save you -- and she'd probably try and stab you in the back before she'd ever help you. Are you going to act like your wannabe-daughter and level half of Equestria trying to hit me hard enough to make me say uncle?"

There was a flash, and a ring appeared around Discord and Celestia, boxing gloves popping up on his talons and Tia's horn. He bounced from side to side, smirking.

"Come on, give it your best shot! It went so well last time."

Celestia was quiet for a moment, closing her eyes and thinking.

"Tia, please, we've done that song and dance!" Discord laughed, the boxing ring vanishing. "Look, I promise, it'll be fun this time! I have plenty of ideas and if you ask me really, really nicely, I'll give you a front-row seat." He looked around, then spotted Sunset glaring at him. "I'll even give you a show of goodwill." He snapped his talons, and Sunset reappeared next to Celestia, flesh and blood again.

"Are you okay?" Cadance whispered.

"That felt awful," Sunset groaned. "It was like being in a nightclub where all the lights are constantly flashing in your eyes."

"Discord," Celestia said. "Those options you mentioned?"

"There's only really one option," Discord muttered. "The one where you give up and get to watch things from box seats."

"I was thinking of taking the latter option, actually," Celestia said. Her horn blazed with light. "I'm sorry, everypony," she said, as she quickly cast Any Tele-port in a Storm, teleporting everypony out of the room except for her and Discord.

"The latter option?" Discord raised an eyebrow.

"The one where I hit you until you cry uncle," Celestia specified. Her horn lit up again, and a blast of force slammed into Discord, the wall behind him, and then out into Canterlot airspace to impact a very unfortunate cloud that immediately evaporated.

"You're out of practice," Discord noted, from behind Celestia.

"I am," Celestia admitted. "But I did teach Sunset Shimmer everything she knows." She braced herself, the air around her crackling with tiny balls of light and heat.

"Is that supposed to scare me?" Discord snorted, rolling his eyes. A bolt of fire slammed down from the sky, right through the ceiling and into Discord. The floor gave out and turned into molten slag, Discord falling down into the pit below.

"No, but it's a start," Celestia said.

Chapter 23

There were a few different ways to teleport. The easiest, and the one that Sunset Shimmer had mastered, simply created a bubble in space and then changed where that bubble (and everything in it) was located. It was similar to painting a different house number on your front door and expecting to have the building appear down the street, except unlike that, it worked and didn't violate any local zoning laws about shifting houses around.

The spell Celestia had used was called 'Any Teleport in a Storm' and was designed as way to escape to safety even when the caster wasn't sure where the nearest safe place was. It was significantly more difficult to cast than Sunset's, but also ensured that you didn't appear a thousand feet in the air, inside solid rock, or on fire.

As a result, Princess Cadance, Sunset Shimmer, Twilight Sparkle, and Midnight Twinkle arrived quite safely at their destination. However, they also had absolutely no idea what that destination was, aside from depressing, damp, dark, and probably a few other words starting with the letter 'D'.

"I hate teleporting," Cadance groaned. "I always feel like I left my lunch behind."

"Cypress trees. Overcast. Constant mist hanging over things." Sunset Shimmer looked around warily. "We've only gone about... a few dozen miles." She groaned. "I can't teleport us back!"

"Is that Canterlot?" Twilight asked, pointing into the distance. Just visible was a plume of smoke rising from the far side of a mountain range. A bolt of light struck down from the sky, painfully bright to look at even from this distance, and there was a rumble of distant thunder.

"She must be fighting Discord," Sunset said. "I've never seen a spell like that." She paused. "I can't believe she never taught me that spell!"

"I think we have a bigger problem," Cadance said. She pointed up at the gaps in the patchy cloud layer. The sun and moon were chasing each other across the sky like a cat pursuing a mouse.

"What?" Sunset gasped. "Is Discord doing that?"

"Do you know a lot of other people that could?" Cadance asked.

"But if he's moving the sun, what happened to Princess Celestia?" Midnight asked.

Sunset narrowed her eyes in the shifting light, watching the sky intently. The sun froze in place for just a moment, like a baleful eye staring down through the haze of clouds.

And on its surface, in black sunspots, was the mirror image of the Mare in the Moon.

"I'm going back to Canterlot," Sunset said, her throat dry. "Maybe she's- she might still be okay. I can help."

"She didn't want us in the way," Cadance said. "We need to respect Celestia's wishes."

"Princess Celestia makes a lot of bad decisions!" Sunset snapped. "She's a cornucopia of poor judgement sometimes! If we go right now we can... we can..." She trailed off.

"Neither of us is as strong as her. What we need to do is come up with a plan. A good plan. If we run out and get hurt, well..." Cadance looked down. "As awful as it sounds, the two of us might be Equestria's last hope."

Midnight coughed. Sunset and Cadance turned to look at the two younger mares.

"In case you've forgotten, we're here too," Midnight said. "And we're like, super strong compared to the average pony. Plus I've got adventuring experience and Twilight is very well-read."

"I do read a lot of books." Twilight agreed.

Sunset looked at Cadance, then back at Midnight and Twilight. "This isn't a good time or place for this discussion. I've been here before, and it's not safe outside even during the daytime."

Midnight looked up at the shifting sky. "Is it daytime?"

Twilight shook her head. "I'm not sure what to call it."

"If we're not sure, that only makes it more dangerous," Sunset said. "There are things here that eat ponies." She started walking, her hooves sinking into the soft, wet moss that formed the ground. "Town should be this way."

"I've never seen this many bat ponies in one place," Twilight whispered. "They're all staring at us!"

Hollow Shades felt like a dead town. The constant dampness had clearly taken its toll on the buildings, all of them looking ancient and half-rotten. The architecture itself was vertical and gothic, with overhanging eaves that stretched so far out into the streets that they nearly touched the building on the opposite side, like the buildings were stretching into a tunnel above them. Yellow eyes stared from the shadows as they passed, bat ponies watching them intently.

"They might remember the last time I was here," Sunset said. "I had to chase down a Timber Marewolf. She'd gotten infected by a forest spirit and she was going totally feral. Turned out that she'd cut down some kind of ancient tree and the ghost of the tree itself had cursed her."

"What did you do?" Midnight asked.

"Only way to get rid of a ghost is to burn the body," Sunset shrugged. "Thankfully dead trees burn really well. Unfortunately, it had been turned into lumber and used to build part of her house, so, uh, I ended up causing a major structure fire in the middle of town. I might not be super popular around here."

"Actually, I think they're all looking at me," Cadance said. "I get the feeling they don't see a lot of princesses around here."

"You might be right," Sunset muttered. She stepped over to one of the few market stalls dotting the main street. A few bits later, she had four cloaks. "Here. These will keep the rain away and make us stand out less."

"I think it's the only place in Equestria where wearing a spooky cloak makes you fit in," Cadance said, quietly, as she put her regalia away.

"There should be an inn down the street," Sunset said, after they were all appropriately dressed.

"This feels more like a proper adventure now," Midnight said. "We should visit the blacksmith, too."

"Swords won't help," Sunset said, as she led them down an almost pitch-black alleyway. They emerged onto another street, almost identical to the first, except for the signs hanging from the buildings. Sunset opened a door, letting light and sound spill out onto the street, and ushered the others inside.

"Oh, well, this is a pleasant surprise," Cadance said, looking around. Instead of a rat's nest like she had been expecting, everything was done up very tastefully in warm-looking wood and red velvet. A few ponies sat at the bar or the booths around the room, all of them speaking quietly. A mare was playing an oddly-shaped string instrument in the center of the room, the music somewhere between a harp and glass bells.

"It's not a bad town," Sunset said, as she slid into a booth, the others following. "Just keep your heads down. Their customs are a little different than the rest of Equestria and it's better just to let them do their own thing and we do our thing."

"Drinks?" Asked a mare as she stepped up to the table.

"Two ales, two teas," Sunset said. "Thank you."

The mare nodded and walked away.

"What's that?" Twilight asked, pointing to a candle-lit shrine in a wall sconce behind the bar. Flowers and small silver medals had been left in front of a small, stylized statue of a rearing pony, wings spread wide.

"A lot of the ponies here belong to the Nightmare Cults," Sunset said. "That'd be one of those different customs that I said to just ignore and keep your head down about."

"A nightmare cult?" Midnight asked. "You mean like Nightmare Moon?"

"Exactly like Nightmare Moon," Sunset whispered. "Celestia never made the cults illegal, so it's not like it's a crime. They mostly just pray to her in the same way a lot of ponies pray to Celestia."

"Why would ponies pray to Celestia?" Midnight tilted her head.

"She moves the sun," Twilight rolled her eyes. "That's pretty important goddess-level stuff."

"Celestia doesn't like it," Sunset said. "So she doesn't encourage them. She doesn't think of herself as a goddess."

"Nightmare Moon is the true ruler of Equestria," the mare said, having returned silently. She put their drinks down on the table. "When Equestria needs her most she'll return to save us."

"She's not giving us a whole lot of help right now," Sunset muttered.

"You could try praying to her, then sleeping," the bat pony suggested. "She listens to dreams and gives answers in prophecy."

"Thanks for the tip," Sunset said, frowning. The mare nodded and walked away. "Getting a decent night's sleep is maybe the best suggestion anypony's had so far."

"The first thing we should do is make sure Twilight and Midnight are kept safe," Cadance said. She sniffed at the ale in front of her, then tried it. "That's got a really strange flavor."

"They brew it with pumpkin," Sunset said. "They eat a lot of squashes and stuff here. Fruits and vegetables don't grow well locally with all the shade."

"Can I try the ale?" Midnight asked.

"You're not old enough," Sunset said. "Drink your tea. Something warm will help after standing out in the rain."

"We're strong enough to help," Twilight said. "We don't have to go somewhere safe. We should go with you so we can help."

"It's dangerous," Sunset said. "I can't protect you."

"We can protect ourselves," Midnight said. "Cadance is the one who needs protecting the most. She probably can't even cast a fireball spell."

"I'm getting pretty good at shield spells," Cadance said, meekly. "But... I don't know if I can help much if it came to a fight."

"Even if you're only throwing low level stuff around, you've got a lot of power behind it," Sunset said. "Don't forget that."

"But with me around it's also going to be difficult to travel without everypony knowing who we are."

"I'm not worried about that. What I am worried about is figuring out how to stop Discord." Sunset's horn flashed, and saddlebags dropped on the table. "Always have an emergency kit ready to summon," she explained.

"What do you have in it?" Cadance asked.

"I bet I know," Midnight said. "Marbles to check if the floor is level, iron rations, flasks of oil, a ten-hoof pole-"

"Mostly food and bits," Sunset said, interrupting her. "And a few maps."

"What about- what about shelter? Or lockpicks?" Midnight asked.

"Or books to read!" Twilight added.

"If I'm in town, I can buy those things with bits. If I'm not in town, food and water are a lot more important than lockpicks." Sunset rolled her eyes. "This isn't like the games you girls play with Shining Armor. This is real life, and nopony has ever owned a ten-hoof pole."

"Your mom is terrible at adventures," Twilight whispered.

"It's a good thing we're here," Midnight whispered back.

Cadance started giggling, and Sunset's eye twitched. She pulled out a few rolled-up maps and spread them on the table, using the cups to hold the corners down.

"We need to figure out where Celestia would have put the Elements of Harmony," Sunset said, looking over a map of Equestria. "I think it's pretty safe to say she didn't put them at the bottom of the ocean or in Griffonia."

"They've got to be in Equestria," Cadance agreed.

"It would help if I knew what they looked like," Sunset sighed. "Or how big they were, where they were kept, or how they were used in the first place."

"Well, they can't be as big as a city or they'd be hard to hide," Cadance offered. "And if Celestia was being literal about wielding them in battle against Discord, maybe they're weapons. Like, swords and axes and spears."

"I don't think so," Sunset said. She tapped her hoof on the map while she tried to remember everything she'd ever heard about them. "If they turned Discord to stone it implies that they're some kind of spellcasting focus."

"Well, according to the book I found, they're gems," Midnight offered. "Remember? It was about Luna and Celestia, and in the end how Celestia, um." She blushed. "I guess that's not a safe topic around here."

"No, but... it is a lead," Sunset scratched her chin. "Gems make as much sense as anything else."

"Maybe we should take this another way," Cadance offered. "Where would Celestia put what are probably the most powerful magical artifacts in the world?"

"In a vault," Twilight said. "Logically speaking, we're in a time of relative peace, so the most important thing is to put anything world-changing like that where nopony could get to it. She'd also want the vault to be close to her, so probably in Canterlot itself."

"...No," Midnight said, after a moment of silence. "If they were in Canterlot, she would have taken us there to retrieve the artifacts. That implies that she doesn't actually have them."

"But there's probably information about them," Sunset said. "Celestia has to have something somewhere."

"But we can't go back with Discord there," Cadance countered. "It's dangerous." She looked significantly at Midnight and Twilight.

"I've got enough money here to put them up for a month and keep them fed," Sunset said. "If it takes much longer than that to figure things out, I don't know if bits are going to be all that important at that point."

"Sunset, we can help!" Twilight said, firmly.

"Just don't argue with me right now," Sunset sighed. "Look, we're all... adults, or close enough." She looked at Midnight and Twilight. "We need to get rest. First thing tomorrow, you can make your case about coming with me and Cadance."

"I can't believe they're going to just leave us here!" Midnight huffed, as she paced in circles around the small room. It was nicely appointed, aside from the overly-high ceiling overhead and the exposed beams that made the oil lamps cast strange shadows overhead.

"I can," Twilight said, sadly. "Sunset's your mom. And Cadance is... sort of also your mom?" Her nose scrunched up. "I don't really know if it counts if they're not married."

"So what's that got to do with it?" Midnight asked.

"It's a mom's job to keep her foals safe," Twilight said. "She just wants to keep you out of danger. It's what my mom would do if she was here."

"Well, um..." Midnight stopped pacing. "I'm sure your mom is fine. She seems like a smart pony."

"But she lives in Canterlot and we don't even know what the city is like right now," Twilight said. "She could be all grey and mean like the ponies at the castle."

"If she is, then we'll find a way to fix her. With magic, obviously," Midnight said. "There's probably some kind of spell for it. Celestia probably knows it, so once we defeat Discord and free her-"

"But she didn't even try helping the ponies at the castle," Twilight pointed out.

"It might only work on one pony at a time," Midnight said. "Or maybe Discord has to be defeated first. There's a lot of reasons why she might have decided to avoid it for now."

"Either way, I want to go find her," Twilight said. "I have to know if she's okay, and what happened to my brother. He should have been stationed in the castle. And Spike! He's only a baby dragon! How is he going to take care of himself without me there?"

"What we need is a better plan than just hoping we find the Elements of Harmony and figure out on our own how to make them work," Midnight said. "If Celestia was here she could just tell us where she left them and how they worked last time."

"And she's the only pony who could, which is probably why Discord banished her to the sun," Twilight said. She stepped over to the window and moved the thick curtain enough to look outside. Midnight joined her after a moment. "There's no one on Equestria that knows where they are now."

Outside, the constant drizzle turned the dour little town even less inviting. From this higher floor they could see a courtyard that was hidden from street-level views by a tall wall. A circular pool dominated it, with a statue of Nightmare Moon standing tall in the center. Low-set mage lights made the statue look intimidating and unearthly.

"No one on Equestria," Midnight repeated, muttering. She began to get the spark of an idea. A really terrible idea. It was only a minor variation of a plan she'd come up with years ago, clicking into place like gears suddenly shifting into reverse. She smiled.

"What is it?" Twilight asked.

"I've got a plan. A great plan."

"I don't like that face," Twilight said. "It means that you haven't thought your plan all the way through and you're going to ignore the huge amount of problems involved."

"Don't worry, this is a really stupid plan. It's so stupid it can't possibly fail!" Midnight grinned widely. "What we need isn't Celestia. It's a pony that knows everything about Discord and the Elements of Harmony."

"That's Celestia," Twilight said, flatly. "Unless- no." Her ears folded back. "You can't be serious."

"I'm very serious. We need more firepower, and there's an alicorn just waiting in the wings who would probably be happy to help." She pointed at the statue of Nightmare Moon.

"Excuse me, sir?" Midnight coughed, getting the attention of the black-robed batpony tending to the small garden of nightshade and ferns. "I was hoping we could speak for a few moments."

The older stallion turned to look at the two young mares, raising an eyebrow.

"About Nightmare Moon," Twilight added, somewhat reluctantly.

"Ah," the bat pony said. "I suppose I shouldn't be surprised. You aren't from around here. Many ponies come asking questions about the true and rightful ruler of Equestria."

"From what I understand, Nightmare Moon and Celestia worked together to defeat Discord the first time he appeared," Midnight said. "Do you know much about that?"

"Of course," the bat pony said. He nodded for them to follow him while he walked towards the statue in the center of the courtyard. From up close, it was even more intimidating than it had seemed from the window. "Long ago, Nightmare Moon and Celestia were friends and sisters..."

"Discord is a menace," Luna said, flatly. "You can't control him and you never have."

Celestia huffed and turned away from her sister, staring out the window. "He's nice. If ponies gave him a chance and tried to be his friend he wouldn't get upset and do things like this."

"He turned the clouds into glue!" Luna yelled. "I was stuck on a raincloud for four hours before I managed to free myself, which wouldn't have been so bad except it flipped over and I was hanging upside-down for most of that time!"

"You insulted him," Celestia said.

"Half the harvest, Celestia," Luna said. "Half of it is ruined. Do you even care about how difficult your 'friend' is making life for our parents?"

"He can fix it!" Celestia retorted.

"He probably can," Luna agreed. "But will he? And even if he does, it doesn't give him the right to ruin that much hard work in the first place. You need to rein him in before I do it myself."

"And lo, Nightmare Moon admonished her spiteful sister and warned her of the danger that she saw forthcoming. As ever, her warnings were ignored." The Bat Pony was clearly reciting things from memory.

"I was kind of hoping he'd just have some reference books," Twilight whispered.

"I think at this point they'd be holy texts," Midnight whispered back.

"What about the final battle with Discord?" Twilight asked. "We're um, sort of on a time limit for this."

The bat pony turned to them and rolled his eyes. "'Skip ahead a bit, brother.' Just like all the foals. You only want to hear the excting parts."

"It's sort of relevant," Midnight said, embarrassed. "We'd really like to hear the whole story sometime, but Discord sort of escaped from confinement and-"

"Discord escaped?!" The bat pony yelped.

"Right, yes. So we just sort of need as much information as possible," Twilight said. "You see, my-" She glanced at Midnight. "Partner? Sort-of-Sister? Classmate? Twin? One of those things. She's got this plan and we need to know how feasible it is."

"...The prophecy says that when the time is right, the stars will aid in Nightmare Moon's release and she will return to reclaim the throne of Equestria," the bat pony said. "It's prophesy rather than history, right at the end of the Book of Darkness. Then it goes on to make a few other minor predictions that make little sense-"

A strong wind blew the mists aside for a moment and pushed Twilight and Midnight's cloaks from their backs, revealing their star-shaped cutie marks.

"...The stars will aid in her escape..." the bat pony muttered. "Tell me about this plan of yours."

Inside, Midnight had spread out her scrolls. "...and you can see here that readings clearly show that between two lunar cycles, the banishment spell has weakened slightly, and successive readings show the decline as accelerating."

"So her escape is near?" The bat pony, who had eventually identified himself as Night Watch, muttered and ran a hoof down the scroll. "What's this part about blowing up the moon?"

"Well, you know," Midnight coughed. "Make plans for everything."

"Why would you ever want to blow up the moon? Millions would die and-"

"Yes, I know!" Midnight huffed. "I've heard this speech before!"

"I didn't know you actually had readings of the banishment spell," Twilight said. "If this is right, the whole thing would break down in a few years. No wonder you had all these crazy plans..."

"There's no way we'll be able to rescue Celestia on our own if we have to contend with a spell like this at full strength," Midnight said. "It's really intense. But with an old spell, fraying at the edges already? We might be able to crack it like an egg."

"I don't know if this is a good idea," Twilight said. "We don't really know what she'll be like. What if Nightmare Moon doesn't even want to help? Hay, what if she joins Discord?"

"She would never do that," Night Watch retorted. "She is Equestria's true queen and-"

"Do you have a better idea?" Midnight asked. "Because we need to do something. Even if she doesn't want to help, she can't make things worse. If nothing else, she'll probably keep Discord busy for a while."

"You know Sunset wouldn't want us to do it," Twilight said.

"We don't need her permission. She wanted us to prove that we could be useful, right? This is the way to do it."

Sunset jotted a few more items down on her wishlist. She wasn't sure that the town would even have an aether collector to sell to her, but she wouldn't know for sure until she asked.

"So you still think we should go to Canterlot?" Cadance asked. She hadn't bothered replacing her regalia. She didn't feel much like a princess right now. "But you said-"

"I know what I said. If the Elements were there, she would have used them," Sunset said. "But it's still the only place with clues. You know how much Celestia liked her secrets and her layers within layers and-" Sunset shook her head. "Is this why she had you and me splitting her duties? Did she know this was going to happen?"

"I think she knew something was going to happen," Cadance suggested. "I mean, given enough time-"

Sunset stopped and clutched her chest, wincing.

"What's wrong?" Cadance asked, standing up and taking a step towards her.

"I-" Sunset groaned as her leylines erupted in light again, the pain overwhelming her for a moment. It was so bright that the entire room was glowing with cyan light. "It's just a bad reaction to all the magic that got thrown around." Her voice was strained.

"This is happening more and more often," Cadance said, keeping her distance. "It's getting worse."

"A lot of things are getting worse!" Sunset snapped. "Right now I'm worried about Equestria getting worse, not about-" she grunted and the light coming from her body flickered. "-some stupid medical condition! I can control this. I just have to push it back and..." She closed her eyes and held her breath, sweat dripping from her body as the light finally faded away. "T-there. Done."

She was shaking like a leaf, her body clearly pushed to its limits.

"What are you going to do if that happens while we're trying to deal with Discord?" Cadance asked.

"I'll keep it under control," Sunset said. Her tone sounded more like a challenge than a fact. "But... I think we could use some help. Not for me. Two of us infiltrating Canterlot, that's not a lot of hooves on the ground. If we can hire on a couple more ponies to help, we'll have a better shot at it."

"What were you thinking?" Cadance asked.

"Well, we've got a sorceress and a paladin," Sunset muttered. "Might as well try for a fighter and a thief. Somepony strong so they can help if we run into those ponies Discord is controlling, and somepony sneaky who can help us get into the castle without being seen."

"And you were yelling at Midnight for treating this like a game?" Cadance smiled a little.

"Hey, unlike Midnight, I know what I'm doing. Sort of. I've done a little breaking and entering in my time. If I can sneak books out of the forbidden section of the library without Celestia finding out, I can handle a chaos spirit who doesn't know all of my tricks yet."

"And you still want help?"

"I hedge my bets," Sunset said, simply. "If there's anything really important that I've learned from Celestia, it's that anything worth doing is worth doing with friends. Or with mercenaries, in this case. Tartarus, if they can actually help I'll make them my new best friends."

"Ah yes, nothing quite like friendship forged in the heat of battle," Cadance giggled. "Shining Armor might be able to tell us all about that." She paused. "I hope he's okay."

"He's a meathead, but he's also got a shield strong enough that I can't punch through it without exhausting myself," Sunset smiled. "I'm sure that he's fine. If I know him, he's probably working on his own rescue plan."

"You're right," Cadance said. "I guess we shouldn't be the ones slacking, then." Her ears twitched. "You know, the bar downstairs has gotten a lot louder."

"But it's the middle of the-" Sunset stopped. "Of course. Bat ponies. They're nocturnal. Come on, I'm going to do some recruiting and I could use a cute face."

"But you've already got one," Cadance said, pinching Sunset's cheeks.

"Fine, then I can use a nice flank," Sunset said, slapping Cadance's cutie mark. Cadance squeaked.

"Just don't promise them anything involving my flank."

"It's for the good of Equestria!" Sunset said, as she walked out into the hallway.

"Listen up!" Sunset yelled, from the stairs. Heads turned to look at her, conversations dying. "Everypony, in case you haven't noticed, there's a chaos spirit out there who thinks he can rule Equestria." She stepped down to the first landing, looking out over the crowd.

"While all of you are sitting here drinking and eating, he's destroying everything that lets us live in peace and harmony. I know what the griffons say, about how ponies don't like to fight, how they just run away from danger. That's a load of horseapples. All real Equestrians love a battle. When you were foals, you all admired the fastest flyer, the toughest guards, the champion archer. Equestrians play to win all the time. That's why Equestria has never lost and will never lose a war."

Sunset threw back her hood

"I know you're scared. Everypony is scared the first time they go into a real fight. Anypony who says he isn't is a liar. But we have a duty to the ponies around us and ourselves to do everything we can to fight for Equestria."

The bat ponies watched her with rapt attention. Cadance's wings were starting to stiffen on their own. She'd never heard Sunset make a speech like this before. It made her wonder if she could get her to be that commanding in bed.

"My name is Sunset Shimmer. I'm the strongest unicorn any of you are ever going to see because there isn't anypony stronger anywhere. Behind me is Princess Mi Amore Cadenza, and don't bother bowing because I want ponies who don't bow for anyone or anything."

She scanned the room, trying to read the expressions on the bat ponies. It wasn't easy. All of them were equally dour and stoic.

"I know what you're all thinking. If I'm so strong, why do I need help? Well, everypony has a part to play. If we all sit back and do nothing except search for the bottom of our cups, Discord is going to come here and turn you inside out just to see what you do when your wings are tickling your spleen."

Sunset stepped down the rest of the way to the middle of the room.

"Tomorrow, I'm going to Canterlot and I'm going to find a way to solve this mess. I'm not going to sit here and hope Discord doesn't show up and I'm not going to run away. The only way to win a fight is to fight it! Thirty years from now when you're sitting here and your grandfoal comes up and asks 'what did you do when Discord came back' you don't have to tell him you hid in your cellar and waited for somepony to save you. You can look him right in the eye and say 'Son, I saved Equestria with that awful bitch named Sunset Shimmer!' Now, who's with me?!" Sunset looked around the room.

It was dead silent.

"Nopony?" Sunset asked. "None of you? Is that it? Am I really looking at a room full of cowards? I didn't think anywhere was worse than Canterlot for useless bucking ponies sitting around and doing nothing, but maybe I was wrong!"

"It's not our problem," the bartender said, after no one answered her challenge. "If Discord wants Equestria he can have it."

"If- you live in Equestria!" Sunset snapped. "This is your problem too!"

"Why? Nopony ever helped us," a pony from across the room snorted. "Make all the speeches you want, all we want is to be left alone."

Cadance cleared her throat. "As a Princess of Equestria, I could order all of you to help, but I won't. If you don't want to help you don't have to. And if I'm being honest, if saving another pony isn't enough for you, I don't think I'd want your help anyway."

"Not my princess," grumbled another pony. "I didn't vote for her."

"You don't vote for royalty," another bat pony said. "They just get foisted on you like the weather or taxes."

"If you'll come with me to Canterlot and help me stop Discord I'll pay you," Sunset said. "One thousand bits. More if we run into trouble. If you want to handle this like mercenaries, we'll handle this like mercenaries."

"Do we look like griffons?" A pony yelled. "You can't just throw bits on the ground and expect us to kneel down before you and pick them up!"

"What you look like is cowards!" Sunset snapped. She turned and stomped back towards the stairs. "Come on, Cadance. It's clear we won't find help here after all."

"I thought your speech was really good," Cadance whispered.

"I stole it from General Pot Iron," Sunset muttered. "Paraphrased it a bit. It was the speech he gave before the siege of Beakwind and Talonko during the Second Griffonian War."

"It was still really good," Cadance said.

"Yeah, well, unlike me he was talking to ponies who actually wanted to protect their loved ones."

"One egg," Twilight said, reading from the checklist. They'd gathered back outside in front of the statue of Nightmare Moon. A big open area under the sky was practically a requirement for what they were doing.

"Check," Midnight reported. She sniffed. "It's fresh, too."

"Three bits of wood," Twilight said, moving to the next item.

"We only need two for the Rite," Midnight said. She held up the sticks.

"We'd only need two if we had rat blood on hoof," Twilight corrected. "And you know how angry Celestia got last time we used blood in spellcasting."

"I think she was angry because the Succubus started hitting on her," Midnight said. "Which was kinda hot. Until she banished it back to Tartarus."

"Yes, well," Twilight blushed. "We still managed to keep it around for a few hours before she found out, and that was more than long enough for- for the experiments we had planned out."

Midnight coughed. "Yes. The experiments. And gathering occult materials like horn shavings and... other materials."

"Right, yes." Twilight agreed quickly. "Which was all we did, as we both agreed was the story."

"This doesn't seem right," Night Watch frowned. "We need more dripping candles and burning incense. It's not a proper magical ritual without so much incense that you can't see your hoof in front of your face."

"You don't need all that for an unbounded summoning," Midnight said, rolling her eyes. "All you need for the most basic form of the Rite is a chicken egg and some wood. Ebony works best, but you can use anything except pine."

"Why can't you use pine?" Night Watch asked, curious.

"All evergreens are troublesome, but pine always shatters when you do the Rite. Even balsa wood isn't as bad about it. Something to do with resonance."

"I see," Night Watch muttered. "The workings of magic are strange."

"It's not strange, it's a science. A magical science." Twilight put her checklist to the side. "Now we just need to draw a perfect heptagon." She started sketching on the ground, marking points and drawing perfect lines in chalk.

"Should I be doing anything?" Night Watch asked.

"No, you've done a lot," Midnight said. "Thanks for the ritual robes. I don't know if they're actually blessed or not, but they really help with the ambiance."

"They were passed down through the blessed children of Nightmare for a thousand years." He said, proudly.

"And they were washed, right?"

"Of course," he said. "Dry-clean only. The material is very delicate. They haven't been worn since last month's Full Moon Fiesta, and they've been washed since."

"Full Moon Fiesta?" Midnight raised an eyebrow.

"Just because we're part of a cult doesn't mean we can't have fun once in a while," Night Watch said. "We're having a chili cook-off next week. Naturally, if you manage to free Nightmare Moon from her prison, you'll be invited as guests of honor."

"I do like chili," Midnight admitted.

"Heptagram is complete," Twilight announced.

"Can we use a little incense?" Night Watch asked. "It doesn't seem important enough without incense."

"Fine, light a few sticks," Twilight sighed. "Just keep it light. I have allergies."

"I don't have allergies," Midnight said.

"Well I don't have glasses," Twilight said, rolling her eyes. "Guess nopony's perfect. Now, if you'd please help me instead of discussing bean soup and old dresses?"

"They're robes, not dresses," Night Watch corrected.

"Whatever," Twilight said. "Midnight, I need your help with this."

Midnight stepped into place on the opposite end of the circle. Twilight carefully arranged the three sticks into a triangle and balanced the egg on its end in the center.

"Now remember," Midnight said. "It's a reversed banishment spell combined with a channeling spell. It should be almost like a magical syphon effect. We create an area of 'low' pressure and Nightmare Moon should, for lack of a better term, flow towards it along the channel created."

"And you're sure we don't want to even try putting a few protective or binding measures in place?" Twilight asked.

"The spell is experimental enough without having to reach through a Magic Circle Against Harm. Besides, she's as strong as Celestia. Do you know any magic circles that would hold Celestia?" Midnight smirked.

"No, and she'd probably be really upset even if they did work," Twilight sighed.

"Right. We want a good first impression. The ritual robes will help with that, and so will having a high priest of her cult."

"I will be the first of my brethren to see the return of our Eternal Queen of Darkness," Night Watch whispered, excited.

"See? I'm sure she'll love it. Ready?" Midnight smiled.

"We have to wait for midnight." Twilight looked up at the randomly changing sky. "Which might be... difficult."

"Do you think it's more important to have the sun out of the sky or the moon at its zenith?" Midnight asked.

"Well, the binding spell on the sun might really mess with the ritual," Twilight said. "But we need accuracy if we want Nightmare Moon to appear here instead of in Hippon, and that means having the moon where we want it."

"You know, as random as it looks, I think there's a pattern to it," Midnight said. "Like how ponies can't really generate random numbers. They have bias."

"They always pick three or seven," Twilight said. "Even numbers don't feel random, five is right in the middle, one and nine are too extreme, so they either do three or seven."

"Exactly," Midnight said. "Because it's not really random, there's a thought process behind it." She watched the sky for a minute. "It's been day for a while, so to make it 'feel' random it'll be night soon."

"Gambler's fallacy," Twilight muttered. "In a really random event streaks are just as likely as any other series of events."

The sky darkened. The moon moved in a twitching motion like the hand of a ticking clock, swerving through the sky as it lurched.

"Start casting!" Twilight said, channeling magic into the spell. Midnight did the same, magic sparkling in the center of the circle like a field of stars as space and time warped.

The moon hit its zenith, and stopped, flashing with colors. The egg in the center of the circle cracked, the three sticks catching alight with blue flame as dark mist poured from the cracked egg into a dense cloud of smoke.

Laughter rang as if from a great distance, coming closer.

"I think it's working!" Twilight yelled.

The circle erupted with light, and the moon jerked, continuing on its path. the smoke hanging in the air solidified, a shape coming into focus, rising up and looming over them with dark magnificence.

Eyes opened, and looked down on the tiny gathering with slit, dragon-like pupils.

"My queen!" Night Watch threw himself to the ground, prostrating himself.

"Equestria?" Nightmare Moon asked, as her body reformed, showing fangs when she spoke. "And even sooner than I expected." Her voice was haughty and melodious, harder and more authoritative than Celestia's. "Soon, the night will last forever!"

With a crackle of thunder, she reformed completely, a mare as tall and imposing as Celestia without a trace of the kindness or softness that the sun princess possessed. She laughed, her voice echoing through the streets. Twilight looked at Midnight, suddenly unsure of what they were doing.

"This was a great plan!" Midnight whispered, pleased.

Chapter 24

Laughter echoed down the streets. Sinister, blood-curdling laughter that would have signaled the end of the world if not for the fact that the world was likely already in the process of ending and Equestria had a strictly imposed limit of one apocalypse at a time.

"This gathering is smaller and more intimate than I had expected," Nightmare Moon said, looking at the three ponies before her. "But it is very good to see my sister hasn't completely wiped out all those who would bend knee to the true ruler of Equestria."

"We have kept the faith, Dark Mistress!" Night Watch said, from where he was busy throwing himself at the ground in abject worship.

"Of course," Nightmare Moon said, stepping out of the circle. Her eyes flickered to Midnight and Twilight. "I take it you two performed the ritual. I see you went to great expense to..." She stopped and actually looked at the remains of the ritual. "...procure an egg?"

"We used a combination of the Ritual of Al Az'hoof and a pretty standard Mana Drain to provide a long-distance channel," Twilight supplied, helpfully.

"Hmph," Nightmare Moon frowned. "It used to take three live chickens and a circle of salt."

"It's been refined over the years," Twilight said. "In the last few Thaumaturgical Quarterly issues, there's been debate about if the outer chalk heptagon is actually required or if you can just omit it and use an ellipse with the egg at one of the focal points. It would be a lot easier to draw, but there's a loss of efficiency-"

"Yes, yes," Nightmare Moon said, cutting her off. "There have no doubt been countless advances made since I was imprisoned. Now, my minions, I must strike before my sister is able to make preparations. I assume you have an army ready to march on Canterlot?"

"Uh..." Midnight looked at Twilight. "About that. There's a bigger problem, which is why we needed you."

"A bigger problem for my minions than my eternal nemesis? A bigger problem than the usurper who refused to bow down-"

"Discord," Midnight cut in. "Discord is free. Celestia tried to fight him, but she's..." Midnight looked up at the sun. Nightmare Moon followed her gaze and saw the sunspots splayed across it.

"This is not how I'd planned my glorious return," Nightmare Moon pouted, her lips pursing.

Sunset Shimmer ran down the street towards the huge source of magic she'd sensed. She could tell even from this distance exactly who was to blame.

"When I find Midnight I am going to ground her until she's so old that ponies will have to use carbon dating to figure out how many candles to put on her birthday cake!" Sunset yelled.

"I'm sure it's not that bad," Cadance said. "She's probably just trying to do something to impress you. She wants your approval."

Cadance turned the corner and spotted the huge black form of Nightmare Moon. Her hooves skidded on the wet cobblestones as she pressed herself up against the wall, eyes wide.

"Never mind," Cadance whispered. "It's that bad."

"If you're trying to hide, you're doing a poor job of it," Nightmare Moon said, her voice booming. Cadance's ears folded back. "Come out here and we can... talk." There was an implied threat if talking didn't happen.

"Oh for Harmony's sake," Sunset muttered, stomping into the courtyard.

"I know that expression," Nightmare Moon smirked. "It's the one everypony makes when nothing is going as planned!"

"You have no idea," Sunset sighed.

"Well, you're in luck," Nightmare Moon said. "Because unlike my sister, I will be taking care of this problem. Equestria is mine, and I will not allow Discord to rule my kingdom."

"Don't worry, Mom," Midnight said. "I put a lot of thought into this. Nightmare Moon is at least as strong as Celestia, and there's no way Discord will be expecting this, so there's the element of surprise!"

"Far stronger than my sister," Nightmare Moon corrected. "She had to cheat just to banish me. Thankfully, I am here to take command and fix her mistakes, something that I've had to do many times."

"No," Sunset said, firmly. "I am not going to follow some evil-"

"Have you defeated Discord before?" Nightmare Moon snapped. "Do you know how to use the Elements of Harmony? Because I did and I do."

Sunset bit back a retort. "I'm not going to help you destroy Equestria."

"I've never wanted to destroy it. I want to rule it." Nightmare Moon scoffed and shook her head. "I've already lorded over a barren crater-filled wasteland for a thousand years. I have no desire to repeat that experience."

"This is a terrible idea," Sunset muttered. "Midnight, you can't even begin to conceive of how much trouble you're in."

"She's not in any trouble," Nightmare Moon smirked. "As Equestria's only princess, I pardon her. The first of many boons that I see fit to grant."

"Actually, um," Twilight started. "There's also Princess Cadance."

"Ah, she must be the one cowering behind the wall," Nightmare Moon said, dragging Cadance into the courtyard with her magic. "I'm so very pleased to meet fellow royalty." She smiled. The fangs did not made it look like a happy smile.

"I, uh," Cadance coughed. "I-I'm pleased to meet you too."

"Wonderful," Nightmare Moon said. "As long as you remember that I am the ruler of Equestria and you are not, we'll get along splendidly."

"Before you declare yourself ruler of anything, Discord needs to be taken care of," Sunset Shimmer said. "You want to be in charge? Fine. I'm waiting to hear your amazing plan."

"It's simple. We'll retrieve the Elements of Harmony," Nightmare Moon said. "I'll re-establish my bond with them, and then use them to defeat Discord. He'll never even see it coming before it's too late."

"And you know where the Elements are?" Sunset asked.

"Of course. There's only one place they could be - the Castle of the Twin Sisters." Nightmare Moon scoffed. "Where would they be except for the nation's center of power?"

"The Castle of the Twin Sisters?" Cadance frowned. "What's that?"

"Well, my sister may have changed the name. The castle in the Everfree." Nightmare Moon shrugged. "I suppose she wouldn't have wanted to keep me in living memory."

"...There's a castle in that forest?" Midnight asked.

"Yes." Nightmare Moon's eyes narrowed. She was clearly getting annoyed. "And you two will come with me. It's clear that despite what talent you have, your education has significant gaps."

"They're not coming. The Everfree forest is dangerous," Sunset said.

"A great many things are dangerous," Nightmare Moon snorted. "You do them no favors by coddling them and hiding them away. They are willing and able to take care of themselves. In freeing me, they demonstrated both common sense and the willingness to take action."

"They're fillies!" Sunset protested. "It's not safe!"

"The world is rarely safe," Nightmare Moon said.

"My Lady, the ponies of Hollow Shades wish to pay tribute to you," Night Watch interrupted. "We have all awaited your return to us, and it is an honor to be part of the generation that witnesses your rebirth."

"Of course you are honored," Nightmare Moon said, smugly. "But there is little time for celebration. The element of surprise is lost if Discord notices my presence before I am ready to finish him."

"We can quickly prepare a feast, My Lady," Night Watch said.

"No. It will wait until after I have defeated the chaos spirit," Nightmare Moon ordered. "This presents a useful opportunity for me. Not only have I returned in my full glory, but I do so and prove myself my sister's better at the same time. Even her own sun-worshipping lackeys will have to kneel before me once I have saved them from this disaster."

"Of course, Mistress of Eternal Night," Night Watch bowed deeply. Motion from above drew eyes up to the rows of bat ponies watching from the high rooftops, starting down as dour and grey as gargoyles. All of them paid tribute to Nightmare Moon, who looked at them and frowned slightly.

"The journey should not be long from here," Nightmare Moon said, her voice slightly subdued. "Have provisions readied for these four." She gestured to Midnight and the others.

"Would you like us to accompany you, My Lady?" Night Watch asked. "We are all ready to live and die at your command."

"No," Nightmare Moon said, quickly. "I... find it best to move with a small group."

"But surely some of your faithful-"

"Do not question my decisions!" Nightmare Moon snapped. "I will be taking the princess who ascended during my absence, the only pony who has been brave enough to speak back to me, and the two who were skilled enough to release me. They will serve me well enough."

"Yes, Mistress of the Night," Night Watch whispered, throwing himself to the ground in fear. "Forgive me."

"There is nothing to forgive. It has been too long since I walked among you. Make the provisions ready." Nightmare Moon stalked off into the streets, looking distinctly unhappy.

"Why didn't we teleport the whole way?" Midnight groaned, as they walked through the marsh, her hooves threatening to sink all the way down to her knees with every step.

"Large displays of magic get his attention," Nightmare Moon explained. "Large groups of ponies do the same. A smaller group like this is more likely to go unnoticed."

"Is that why you didn't want to take any of the bat ponies with us?" Midnight asked.

"That and I don't trust them," Nightmare Moon said. "They're all grey and..." She shook her head. "I wonder if Discord has already influenced them."

"They've always been like that," Sunset said.

"Even before his release?" Nightmare Moon mused. "Troubling. They were far more... colorful before my imprisonment."

"How long will it take to get to the castle?" Cadance asked.

"Two days," Nightmare Moon said. "Or at least, some of you will need to rest and sleep before we arrive. With Discord controlling the sun and my precious moon, measuring time is difficult."

"While you were gone they developed methods of telling time that don't rely on the position of the sun," Twilight noted, brightly.

"Really?" Nightmare Moon raised an eyebrow.

"Sundials were always notoriously unreliable, you know?" Twilight said. "They required calibration for where you were, the time of year, the weather, and they only worked half of the time anyway since they were useless once the sun went down."

"The same is true of anything that relies purely on natural phenomena," Nightmare Moon said. "My subjects would use slow-burning candles marked with the hours to tell the time, though the Saddle Arabians had some impressive timepieces that used alternately rising and falling water."

"Right, water clocks were some of the first fairly reliable timepieces," Twilight agreed. "But they're hard to move and sort of messy when something goes wrong. Now we use mechanical clocks. They use precisely calibrated springs and gears. They're fairly robust and very accurate, and they can be made small enough for a pony to carry in a pocket."

"I'll have to remember to have several brought to me," Nightmare Moon said. "I would be interested to see how they function. They'll be quite useful for ponies in my endless night."

"Yeah, at least they'll know when it's lunchtime while they're freezing to death and starving," Sunset Shimmer snapped.

"Don't be a foal," Nightmare Moon said. "Equestria will survive quite well without the sun. I have plans that will ensure that ponies do not suffer under my rule. Instead, they will prosper."

"With no crops?" Sunset Shimmer asked. "Kind of hard to prosper when nothing will grow."

"I said I have a plan!" Nightmare Moon snapped, turning to face Sunset Shimmer. "And those plans include dealing with ponies who oppose me. If you would like to see those plans in great detail, feel free to continue tempting me. I do not need your help, or anypony's help. Is that clear?"

"Crystal," Sunset grumped, frowning.

Nightmare Moon glared at her a moment longer before turning back to the path and continuing. "Ponies wonder why I got fed up with my sister and then they act like this when I'm trying to save the world."

"It's been a long day for all of us," Cadance said, giving Sunset a sympathetic look.

"Oh, I am aware," Nightmare Moon said. "It can't be easy for my sister's former student to have to bend knee to me."

"How did you know Mom was Celestia's student?" Midnight asked.

"The same way I can speak modern Equestrian. I had little to do on the moon except plan my revenge and watch the dreams of ponies from afar. The latter was the only thing that kept me from going insane." Nightmare Moon smiled, showing fangs. "Sunset Shimmer appeared in the dreams of quite a few ponies. Most of them seemed afraid of her."

"Really?" Midnight asked. "Why?"

"Some of them have had nightmares about her for as long as she's been in Canterlot," Nightmare Moon said, gleefully. "Apparently she has not been very kind to her fellow students."

Sunset seethed, gritting her teeth. Cadance bumped into her and smiled, then picked up her pace to walk next to Nightmare Moon.

"Can we talk?" Cadance asked. "I haven't been a princess for very long and I really don't know much about you."

"No? But we have so much in common," Nightmare Moon said, very seriously. "Both of us have lived in my sister's shadow and ruled over nothing that we couldn't hold in our own hooves."

"It wasn't that bad," Cadance said. "I need more experience before I'm ready to go around giving ponies orders."

"No doubt," Nightmare Moon agreed. "It took Celestia and I quite some time to get used to the idea of ruling others. To be blunt, I am not interested in sharing power with you."

"I don't think either of us wants to talk about that, really," Cadance smiled. "Actually, Celestia has been having Sunset take over most of her duties. She's really good at running the court."

"So my sister has gotten lazy over time," Nightmare Moon noted.

"Not really lazy," Cadance corrected. "She just trusts Sunset. You know, I think if you and Celestia talked a little, you'd find out she's really changed! I bet she's a lot different than she was a thousand years ago."

"I have spent centuries plotting ways to destroy my sister," Nightmare Moon said. "To make her beg at my hooves for what she did to me. Are you really going to ask me to forgive her?"

"Well..." Cadance's ears folded down. "It's just that you don't seem so bad. My official title is the Princess of Love and, ah, part of that is repairing family problems."

"You're an amusing pony," Nightmare Moon said. "And you at least know to show me some measure of respect. You have given me something valuable to think about, though."

"Really?" Cadance asked, perking up.

"Yes. It will ease the transition if you and Sunset Shimmer continue in your current roles. I suppose you could call it a... buffer between me and the common ponies. They're used to you, and messages that they would not want to hear from my lips will be more palatable when coming from yours."

"That's, um, not really what I was hoping for," Cadance said, quietly.

"Do you know what I did, before I assumed the throne?" Nightmare Moon asked. "As I said, it took quite a while for my sister and I to fall into the rhythms of ruling others."

"I don't know," Cadance admitted. "There aren't any real records."

"When I was very young, I was a farmer. When I was older, and Discord ruled Equestria, I became a soldier and fought against him. My sister took much longer to take to the field, and kept trying to reason with him. Madness, in its own way." She shook her head. "There are beings you cannot reason with. Countless ponies were hurt because she didn't take quick, decisive action."

"Why didn't she?" Twilight asked.

"Because Discord was her friend," Nightmare Moon said. "Her best friend."

"They were friends?" Sunset's nose scrunched at the thought.

"Odd, isn't it?" Nightmare Moon agreed. "I knew he was dangerous from the start, but she wanted to give him a chance. With the wisdom of age and experience I admit she was right to give him a chance to prove himself, but wrong to give as many second chances as she did. You see what became of it."

"Sometimes it's worth it," Cadance smiled. "Look at Sunset. Celestia gave her a second chance, and she's a wonderful pony."

"I'll have to take your biased word for that," Nightmare Moon said. "I will admit she is obviously strong. Her magic is as powerful as an alicorn's, which should be impossible for a unicorn."

"That's because Mom's the best," Midnight asserted. "She hunts monsters and triumphs over evil!"

"Ah, of course." Nightmare Moon nodded. "No wonder she doesn't seem as soft as the other ponies I've seen in the dreamscape. Perhaps she and I are kindred spirits." She looked back at Sunset.

"Don't even start," Sunset warned.

"Miss Nightmare Moon?" Twilight asked. "Can we rest soon?"

"A rest doesn't sound like a bad idea," Cadance agreed.

Nightmare Moon stopped in mid-step, as if lost in thought. "Hm. Yes. We can stop. Set up camp. A small fire will go unnoticed in this dense forest."

"Really? Not going to berate us for being weak mortals?" Sunset asked.

"I was a soldier," Nightmare Moon said. "I know too well that the more tired you are, the more mistakes you make. We can't afford to make many mistakes against the foe we face." She paused. "As I have said, I am the ruler of Equestria. That means you are all my responsibility." Her voice softened. "I don't want you to be miserable, or for us to be foes. I have come into a world with more than enough of those."

"...I understand," Sunset said, at length. "I think... I really understand that feeling."

"Good," Nightmare Moon sighed. "Discord is enemy enough without fighting amongst ourselves. How are you at cooking?"

"Terrible," Sunset shrugged.

"Thankfully I haven't had a meal in a thousand years, and anything would be better than the taste of dusty ice." Nightmare Moon said. "The moon is a wonderful place to visit, but if I were not immortal I would not have lasted longer than a week."

"I take it back," Nightmare Moon said, sniffing at the tin bowl in front of her. "There are indeed some things that will still turn my stomach."

"It's better than it looks," Sunset said. "And you can blame your own people for giving us Guard rations. I've had to survive on them for weeks at a time and the only thing they're good for is reminding you how much you miss real cooking."

"I don't think eggs are suppose to be square," Twilight frowned, looking at her own ration pack.

"Did you get the veggie omelette?" Midnight asked. "Ew. That's the worst. I have the bean patty with barbecue sauce."

"I'll trade you!" Twilight said, hopefully.

"No way," Midnight scoffed. "But you can have my hot sauce. Hot sauce is good on everything."

"When I take over Equestria, the first thing we'll do is have a feast," Nightmare Moon declared. "And the second thing I'll do is find a way to give the military better rations. I wouldn't make any but the most vile criminals eat this."

"Please, the chili mac is the best," Sunset said.

"This is the best?" Nightmare Moon asked, appalled. She sighed and gave her meal to Twilight. "Here. I've waited a thousand years, I can wait a few more for something better to whet my hunger. Perhaps some gravel, or a fallen branch."

"Picky eater," Sunset shook her head, eating her food quickly. "Ugh. Only way out is through. We're going to need these calories to have energy tomorrow, girls."

"Assuming the food doesn't kill us," Twilight muttered. She tried the chili mac. "...That's not too bad..." She started eating more, quickly finishing the bowl.

"I will keep watch while all of you sleep," Nightmare Moon said. "I don't need rest, and you do." She smiled, showing long, sharp fangs. "Unless, of course, you don't trust me?"

Twilight shivered. She couldn't sleep. She wasn't really cold. The thin blanket she'd been given was scratchy and itchy, but it was certainly warm. She'd just never felt quite so alone.

"What's wrong?" Asked Nightmare Moon, quietly. Twilight almost screamed. She hadn't seen or heard the mare in the darkness.

"N-nothing," Twilight lied, looking up at the mare. For a moment she was visible when the sky brightened, but it quickly faded back to darkness, and only her eyes shone through the gloom.

"Why aren't you with the rest of your family?" Nightmare Moon asked.

On the other side of the small campfire, which had burned down to embers, Midnight, Sunset, and Cadance were all huddled together.

"They're not my family," Twilight corrected her.

Nightmare Moon looked at Midnight, then at Twilight, then raised an eyebrow, waiting for an explanation.

"It's complicated. She's like a copy or double or something. Sunset adopted her because she accidentally made her. My family is back in Canterlot. I hope." Her voice lowered even more at the last part.

There was a soft sound as Nightmare Moon laid down next to Twilight, close enough that Twilight could feel the warmth from her body.

"What is your family like?" Nightmare Moon asked.

"My mom is a writer. Dad does stuff in the government. My brother is part of the Royal Guard."

"I see. No wonder you're worried." Nightmare Moon said. "No doubt he's the brave, stupid, heroic type?"

"He's not stupid," Twilight pouted.

"All heroes are stupid," Nightmare Moon said. "I speak from experience. Only a fool charges into danger when it's safer to let another pony take the risk. But without those fools we would all be damned." She paused. "That was always the biggest difference between me and my sister. She would plan and plot and let others take risks for her. She saw the big picture, a grand strategy, but she also forgot that the pieces were ponies. Even when it was her family."

"Sorry," Twilight whispered.

"Sympathizing with me?" Nightmare Moon laughed softly. "Very dangerous. Do not pity me. I made my own choices. But you should be resting instead of worrying about others."

"It's hard not to worry. Midnight has her whole family right here. I don't have anypony."

"Then you have me," Nightmare Moon said. "I have always been the Princess of the Night, and even when I shared a throne with my sister, it was my duty to ensure that our little ponies could sleep soundly."

"What was the night like, back then?" Twilight asked.

"Beautiful," Nightmare Moon sighed. "When Discord is defeated I will show you how beautiful it was. It was dangerous, too, but there's an element of risk to everything worth doing. Even your princess of love would agree with that sentiment."

"Was it different than when Celestia was raising and lowering the sun?"

"Very," Nightmare Moon said. "I would take offense, but you haven't had the opportunity to see what a true artist can do. I will correct that, of course. My sister's night was a pale imitation."

"It sounds nice," Twilight said, smiling a little.

"It was nice," Nightmare Moon said, her voice tinged with sadness. "Not that anypony saw it."

"Ponies see it now." Twilight looked up at what little sky was visible beyond the canopy of leaves. It flashed blue and black at almost random intervals, the stars only becoming barely visible before the glare of the sun washed them out. "I've even got a telescope of my own to study the stars. Dad is really big into Astronomy and he taught me about all the constellations."

"It's good to know scholars haven't entirely given up on it," Nightmare Moon sighed. "But you're hardly a normal pony, Twilight Sparkle."

"Normal ponies are usually too busy at night to study the sky," Twilight said. "Most ponies consider the day to be the time for work, and night to be time to relax and enjoy themselves. Unless you work a night shift, I guess, but that's an edge case and even then-" She coughed, embarrassed. "What I mean is, ever since the advent of modern lighting and urbanization, ponies have been doing more and more after the sun has gone down."

Nightmare Moon smiled slightly. "I suppose it's a start. It's good to know that they won't be entirely helpless once the sun stops rising. I would hate to have to hold their hooves."

"Well there are nightclubs and 24-hour convenience stores and... maybe the night doesn't have to last forever?" Twilight winced, waiting for a rebuke.

"It is not open for debate. You have no idea how much ponies have lost over the ages by ignoring the night." Nightmare Moon looked up. "A simple example. Ponies used to wish upon the stars."

"They still do," Twilight said.

"But they don't know how to do it correctly, or why," Nightmare Moon corrected. "Long ago, ponies knew that the stars had signs and that the signs would affect their destiny."

"Astrology?" Twilight frowned. "But that's junk science."

"Imagine this, Twilight Sparkle. A book is published, a mystery novel whose solution and ending are printed in code. For a time, deciphering the code and solving it is a game, with the reward of the truth and answers to burning questions left in the narrative. The author dies, and years later the book is reprinted, but the publisher makes a careless mistake and misprints the coded section, making it impossible to solve. Ponies read the new version of the book, find no answers within, and say that the first ponies, who had answers, were mistaken, and that the author was a hack who published a junk book." Nightmare Moon paused. "That is the state of Astrology as you know it. A broken puzzle that cannot be solved and casts doubt on all predictions made before."

"So it used to really mean something before?"

"Do you know how far away the stars are, Twilight?" Nightmare Moon asked.

"No one is really sure. Ponies have tried to estimate using parallax effects, but they still just seem to be points of light, so the distance is estimated to be at least-"

"There's one right here." She poked Twilight's chest. "And three more over there." She pointed to where Sunset, Midnight, and Cadance were sleeping. "The distance is zero."

"But that doesn't make any sense," Twilight frowned.

"Not if you think of the sky as a destination. No matter how far or how fast a pegasus flies, they could never reach the stars, the sun, or the moon. That's because they aren't sitting in the sky like diamonds twinkling in black velvet. What you see is... like a mirage or a reflection. And what it reflects is you."

Twilight frowned more. "That doesn't make sense."

"Every light you see in the sky is a soul. Mine and Celestia's are the most obvious, but there is a star for every pony alive, every pony who has ever lived, and every pony who will ever live. Ponies didn't just used to wish upon any star, but their own. They would try and find the twinkling light that was the reflection of the magic within them and cast their wishes upon it."

She paused.

"I suppose it isn't surprising, then, that the stars are only visible at night. Whenever she is around, nopony else in the room matters."

Nightmare Moon stopped talking and looked down at a soft sound at her side. Twilight had fallen asleep, pressed against her. She sighed and pulled up the blanket to cover the young mare. Clearly she wasn't going to be able to go back on patrol.

Chapter 25

A blue bolt of magic curved around the trees, hitting the fleeing timberwolf and scattering it. Nightmare Moon wasn't even looking. She was too busy listening to the pony walking next to her.

"Really? They think Star Swirl was some kind of genius?" She scoffed. "He never finished anything he started. He didn't even finish training my sister and me."

"Well there was the moustache spell," Twilight said.

"And the spell for shaping clay," Midnight added.

"Both of which as just so useful," Nightmare Moon chuckled. "Certainly, before Star Swirl there was simply no way for ponies to grow facial hair or manage pottery."

"But what about, um, magic mirror stuff?" MIdnight asked.

"I vaguely remember him working on something involving mirrors. I was somewhat preoccupied at the time with planning on how to defeat my sister." Nightmare Moon watched her for a few moments. Another stream of magic traced from her horn, striking off into the woods and hitting something that warbled and collapsed. "Why do you ask?"

"Well, I came out of a magic mirror, or I was created by one, and Star Swirl made it..." Midnight trailed off.

Nightmare Moon looked perplexed for a moment, then turned her head to look at Sunset Shimmer. "Are you ponies still telling foals that babies come from a magic mirror? That was an old mare's tale we told foals to stop them asking even when I was young."

"She literally came from a magic mirror," Sunset said. "It's complicated."

"Clearly I will need to learn about the last thousand years in some detail. Perhaps Star Swirl managed something of note after all." Nightmare Moon paused, looking down at her hooves. She scraped away at the top layer of moss and soil, revealing flagstones. "We're very close now. This is the road that led to the castle." She motioned with her head. There was a clear gap in the trees where the road's foundations had mostly kept heavy growth away.

"What should we expect when we get there?" Cadance asked.

"An excellent question," Nightmare Moon muttered. "I thought that she would have made some sort of effort to rebuild..." She paused, looking to the side where the changing light of the sky glimmered from the surface of an almost perfectly circular pond.

The stars had come when she pulled, souls torn free from the Aether and thrown at her sister, a tactic Celestia would never have used herself. Dozens struck down around the castle, several landing direct hits as the elder princess flew and tried to evade Nightmare Moon's attacks.

Every time one exploded into the earth, it a pony's life flickered out and died. Stallions, mares, and foals dropped where they stood, their future burned out in an instant of rage and used as ammunition in a fight most weren't even aware of.

"What are you looking at?" Twilight asked.

"Nothing important," Nightmare Moon said, turning away. "An old mistake. In my first attempt to rule Equestria, I planned poorly. I attacked my sister alone, because I thought I could beat her without assistance."

"So what did happen?" Midnight questioned. "I mean, I know you got banished to the moon."

"I was winning. But it wasn't a quick, decisive victory. I was stronger, but by a thinner margin than I had imagined. The fight was slow, and both of us were using more and more desperate measures."

Nightmare Moon was fighting to the death. Celestia was fighting with one hoof tied behind her back because she wasn't prepared to go that far.

"Luna, please! This is madness!" Celestia's barrier was shivering, starting to resonate out of control as it attempted to withstand the torrent of fire and ice lashing against it.

"You turned them against me!" Nightmare Moon roared. The stones under her hooves shattered at the massive temperature swings in the air. "You let them worship you like a goddess and call me a monster!"

"We can talk about this, Luna! You need to stop this and lower the moon!"

"I will never stop!"

Nightmare Moon's hooves faltered for a moment on the shattered cobblestone under her.

"Things will be different this time," she whispered.

"I think... we're here." Sunset said. Nightmare Moon looked up. The centuries had taken their toll on the castle. The walls were mostly still there, at least the ones that hadn't fallen during her fight against her sister.

"Nothing has changed at all," Nightmare Moon said, quietly. "Come. The Elements should still be in their resting place. The enchantments should keep creatures of disorder from disturbing them."

"Unfortunately," agreed an amused voice, echoing from all around them. "You know, I thought you'd be more amusing, but you're still as stuck up as always, Moonbutt."

"Discord," Nightmare Moon swore. That is, it wasn't literally a swear but the way she said it sure made the chaos spirit's name sound like one. She stepped in front of the others, her wings flaring up. "Stay behind me. Run for the atrium once he reveals himself. Get the Elements while I distract him."

"Such a boring plan," Discord said. One of the gargoyles on the castle moved, the twisted shape gaining color as it turned into the twisted draconequuis. "Just make an end run for the goal and hope the Hail Mary pays off?" He threw a hoofball. A second Discord in hoofball pads caught it before it could hit Nightmare Moon.

"Interception!" A third Discord yelled, appearing with a referee's shirt. "Discord has the ball!"

"And it's good!" The second Discord spiked the ball into the ground, and it vanished in a flash of light along with his padding and the other two copies of himself. "You know, this sort of plan is something I'd expect from your sister, not you."

"I am nothing like her!" Nightmare Moon snapped.

"Oh of course," Discord said. "It's just the height, build, wavy mane~" His hair grew out, wafting along with an ethereal breeze.

Nightmare Moon threw a blast of magic at him, which turned into blueberry jam halfway before it came close, splattering against the ground.

"Please, Moon Moon," Discord scoffed. "You can't expect a direct attack to work."

"You will fall. Unlike my sister, I spent a thousand years preparing for battle-"

Discord waggled a talon. "You spent a thousand years getting ready to have a slap-fight with a sister that you knew would never use her full power against you. I spent a thousand years thinking about the best way to beat you and Celestia. Only one of us came to this battle of wits armed, and unfortunately for you, it's me."

Sunset Shimmer threw a hoof-sized blast of magic at Discord, who simply moved out of the way. The magic rebounded from a tree behind him and caught him in the back, making him stumble forwards.

"You say that like she's alone," Sunset said.

"Don't kid yourself," Discord retorted, glaring at her. "You four are a poor substitute for cake-flanks. The only reason I bothered showing up in person was to savor the dramatic irony of Lulu scrambling to grab for the Elements while she's still dressed up as - how did she put it in the other timeline? Oh yes. Black Snooty."

"You're going to regret being so arrogant," Nightmare Moon growled, baring her fangs.

"No, no. None of that. The irony is so thick you could sell it to a blacksmith. Calling me arrogant, hmph." Discord folded his arms and smiled. "I've already done the big magical throwdown with your infinitely more beloved sister. Doing it again would just be rehashing a joke. No, I think what this calls for is a change in genre."

Discord snapped his fingers, and the world dissolved into white light.

The light faded from Sunset's eyes and her ears filled with the sound of sirens going off all around her, a chaotic din of clanging bells and wailing horns and ponies screaming. Sunset could feel magic around her, not the calm leylines of Equestria but a haze in and around everything.

Sunset shook her head, trying to clear her senses and figure out what was going on. There was rich marble under her hooves, not quite the same as in Canterlot, but with the sense of wealth and age behind it. The walls around her were filled with shelves and lockboxes.

She became aware that she was carrying something. She looked at it. A big burlap sack with a bit sign on it. Given the way it jangled, it was probably full of bits. And with the alarms...

Sunset turned around and saw an open vault door. Well, open was only half the story. Most of it was slag metal now, still glowing hot in places. The rest was twisted by the force and heat of whatever had happened to it. She had a sinking feeling that what had happened to the door was, in fact, Sunset Shimmer.

She looked down at herself. She was wearing a catsuit in gold and black. It was garish and just a little too revealing, especially in back. The half-cape did not help with that at all, and her chest was covered in a symbol like a black sun with slashes across it in the shape of the letter N.

"Okay, this is strange," she muttered. At least her voice sounded right. Now she just needed to figure out why she was robbing a bank. She caught her reflection in a polished steel door. She had a matching mask to go with the suit.

"Why am I wearing a mask?" She muttered, reaching up to take it off. It stubbornly resisted the pull of her hooves. Then it resisted her magic. It was like it was part of her face.

The memories came flooding back to her as the disorientation passed.

"Discord..." She mumbled, looking around.

"Stop right there, Nuclear Nag!!!" The voice echoed. Sunset could almost hear the bold lettering and multiple exclamation marks. It was the kind of voice that would intimidate a pony if they weren't, for example, Sunset Shimmer. She tossed the bag of bits aside and walked towards the melted vault door.

"Now look, I'm not sure whaaaaaat the buck." Sunset trailed off as she looked at what was waiting for her in the bank lobby.

Six ponies stood (well, four of them stood - one was flying and another was flitting from spot to spot like they couldn't stand still even for two seconds) in front of her, and despite the fact she'd never met them, she'd recognize them anywhere.

"The Power Ponies?" Sunset whispered, confused. She looked at the group. The Masked Matter-Horn. Mistress Mare-velous. Radiance. Fili-Second. Saddle Rager. Zapp.

"That's right, criminal scum!" Masked Matter-horn took a step towards her, horn lighting up, presumably preparing for some kind of magical attack.

Sunset blinked slowly, looking over the group.

"Well. This is absolutely not what I expected today," she muttered, talking to herself. "It has to be some kind of illusion. I'll just close my eyes, block it out, and it should fall apart."

Sunset closed her eyes. She didn't have a huge amount of experience with illusion magic, but as long as she didn't believe it was real, there was no way it would be able to–

A hoof moving at supersonic speed smacked into her jaw. She stumbled to the side, and a beam of force flung her back into – she opened her eyes to be sure about this – a cage made of glowing magic, the door slamming shut.

"You're getting lazy, Nuclear Nag," Radiance said, haughtily. "Usually it takes us two minutes to beat you, not two seconds."

"Tis a sad day when even rogues have fallen prey to the vice of sloth," Zapp said, watching as Sunset stood up in the small cage.

"I think there's been some kind of mistake," Sunset said. "I don't even know how I got here. I just sort of woke up in the bank vault."

"Oh yeeeah," Filly-Second snorted, rolling her eyes. "An' I bet dat vault door, it just went and blew itself up, right? I hear dey do dat a lot on some planets. Unfortunately, dis here ain't some planet out in space where vault doors melt themselves."

"Look, I'm not this Nuclear Nag or whatever you called me. My name is Sunset Shimmer." She tried to pull the mask off again, but it stubbornly refused to move.

"Did she just-" Mistress Mare-Velous looked at Masked Matter-Horn. "You can't just say your secret identity like that!"

"It's not much of a secret identity when I'm not even from here," Sunset said. "If this is even a place. I don't suppose anypony has seen an interdimensional portal or a spirit of chaos? No?"

"Stop trying to confuse us with thy twisted words, evil-doer!" Zapp yelled, thunder crashing down around the building. "The only place thou art going is to the dungeon!"

"Prison," Masked Matter-Horn corrected.

"Maybe we should try listening?" Asked a small voice from the doorway. A masked colt stood there.

"Humdrum, we told you to stay outside," Saddle Rager whispered. "The Nuclear Nag is one of our most dangerous enemies!"

"I'm not the Nuclear Nag!"

"I told thou to be silent!" Zapp roared, a blast of lightning striking through the cage to shock Sunset. Sunset yelped and fell to the ground, twitching.

"Was that really necessary?" Mistress Mare-Velous asked. "She isn't even putting up a fight."

"She's the bad guy," Filly-Second said. "She's lucky we don't pound her into a pulp."

"And honestly, with that outfit she deserves it," Radiance noted. "It's garish and awful. More like something from a poor-quality stage production than anything useful."

Sunset groaned and started to get up. "You know, here I am, trying to be a nice pony, and I get beaten up by the bucking Power Ponies-"

She was cut off as a beam like a bar of iron clamped down around her mouth.

"You shouldn't say words like that when children are around!" Masked Matter-Horn said, pointing to Humdrum. "Robbing a bank and being a bad influence on the youth! You'll be going to prison for a long time, Nuclear Nag."

Sunset was not a patient pony. She'd been smacked around, shocked, and now that she was silenced it was just the straw that broke the pony's patience. She started casting a counterspell so she could try to explain herself again, and immediately felt something wrong with her magic.

Energy crawled along her skin, crackling in golden sparks, and the construct around her mouth blew apart a moment before Radiance's cage.

Sunset dropped down as the floor of the cage vanished, into the crater she'd formed. It was molten marble, blazing hot, and she couldn't even feel the heat.

"Okay, something's very wrong with my magic," Sunset muttered. She looked up just in time to see Zapp readying another bolt of lightning. Reacting on instinct, she tried firing a stun bolt at her, the most basic and non-lethal way to incapacitate a pony without hurting them.

A beam of impossible heat and radiation poured out of her, scorching Zapp's feathers as it barely missed her. The torrent cut through the building like a hot knife through butter, the entire bank shaking as Sunset accidentally cut through a load-bearing wall.

"Woah!" Sunset yelped. "Sorry! Something's–"

Something was, at that moment, in her snout. And it was a hoof. Filly-Second punched her clean out of the crater and through the bank counter, papers flying around her and catching on fire as they brushed against her body.

"Will you idiots listen for a second?!" Sunset yelled. A huge hoof grabbed her, and she looked up into the angry face of an enraged Saddle Rager. She was slammed into the wall, then the floor, then the wall again, until she was as limp as a rag doll.

"Ow," Sunset whispered.

"I knew there wasn't a point in listening to her," Radiance said. "She's far too dangerous for a normal prison. We'll have to put her on the moon."

"I don't have time for this..." Sunset muttered. She started to get up, and Saddle Rager stomped her back to the ground.

"I'll freeze her in a block of ice," Masked Matter-Horn said. "That should keep her contained until we can put her somewhere she can't hurt anypony."

Sunset's eyes flashed, and her body started to flare with heat, sparks crawling across her coat. Saddle Rager sniffed at the air, confused, before looking down to see her hoof was on fire. She roared and limped away, clutching her hoof.

"I don't have time for these games!" Sunset screamed. Energy flared up around her and burst outward in all directions, shattering the wall behind her and throwing the power ponies back. The ceiling cracked, and the entire second floor slammed down onto the first, burying the super-heroes.

Sunset panted and looked around, eyes wide. She'd just blown up a bank. Not that she couldn't do that normally, but she hadn't meant to do it. She'd just wanted to get away, explain herself...

A hoof-cuff clapped around her fetlock. She looked up, and a lasso tightened around her neck, pulling her down. Mistress Mare-velous gasped for breath, pulling herself out of the rubble.

"You won't get away with this," Mare-velous said, one eye already starting to swell shut. "Evil never wins in the end!"

"No kidding. That's why I know I'll get out of here, save my daughter, defeat Discord, and burn every comic I can find - and not necessarily in that order." Sunset said. She tugged at the lasso, and it pulled even tighter, choking her.

"If any of my friends is really hurt, you'll be repaid ten-fold," Mare-velous promised, raising a hoof to strike. Sunset tried to swipe it aside, and Mare-velous screamed, the lasso around Sunset's neck loosening as the Power Pony lost concentration.

Sunset tossed the rope aside and looked at her. She clutched her hoof where three jagged lines had been torn through her costume, bleeding badly. Sunset looked at her own hoof. Three silvery claws extended from her hoof, crackling with energy.

"Sorry," Sunset said, lamely. The hoof-cuff melted from her body's heat, and she teleported away, leaving another detonation behind her that closed off the opening in the wall.

Sunset did not appear where she'd intended, which had been the top of a nearby building so she could look around and figure out her options. Instead, her unstable magic threw her through time and space, disorienting her as she finally reappeared in one of Maretropolis' many abandoned warehouses. It was like they had hundreds of the things.

"Okay, that was strange," Sunset said. "Note to self: do not try teleporting again until I can figure out what the buck is going on with my magic."

"Sunset? Is that you?" Asked a familiar, musical voice, tinged with a slight tone of distress.

"Cadance?" Sunset asked, looking around. As if on cue, spotlights turned on, revealing the Princess bound upside-down, dangling over a tank of water. She was, oddly, wearing a school uniform that was at least fifty years out of date, the kind of thing they wore back when–

"Back when the Power Ponies comics first came out..." Sunset muttered to herself.

"Sunset, I am so glad to see you," Cadance sighed. "I've been stuck here for hours! Do you know how dizzy you get when you're hanging head-down for that long?"

"I'll have you down in a second," Sunset said. "This whole thing is a mess."

"What's going on?" Cadance asked. "Why are you wearing that costume?"

"That is a really good question," Sunset agreed. "And the answer is, apparently, Discord. My magic is all messed up, too, so I'm going to have to figure out some other way to get you down. Just hang on, okay?"

"I'm not going anywhere," Cadance sighed.

"Where would I put a lever..." Sunset muttered, walking around the tank until she found a control panel. "And of course, nothing is labeled."

"You know, this reminds me of that time I asked you to try role-playing more in the bedroom and I pretended to be a helpless captive–"

"This is really not the time," Sunset said, blushing. "I'm pretty sure it's against the comic code anyway."

"The comic code?" Cadance asked, trying to turn around to look behind her at what Sunset was doing and only ending up spinning herself completely around. "Oh boy. Now I'm gonna be sick..."

"Okay, this is probably it." Sunset pushed a button. A buzzer sounded, and a gate opened at the bottom of the tank of water, sharks swimming into the enclosure.

"...That wasn't the right button," Cadance supplied.

"Well, maybe it's this one?" Sunset tried a second button. A jet of flame shot out of the wall, only barely missing Cadance. The rope above her, the one keeping her from falling into the shark tank, started smoldering.

"Not that one!" Cadance yelped.

"This one?" Sunset pulled a lever. Lasers scythed through the air at random around Cadance.

"Sunset, stop pressing buttons!" Cadance screamed.

"I'm trying to help!" Sunset yelled.

"This is not help! This is the opposite of help!" Cadance threw herself to the side to avoid a laser.

"I can fix this!" Sunset pushed the lever the other way.

The rope started to lower Cadance towards the sharks, the predators circling around under her. "You keep making it worse!" Cadance wailed. "Stop helping me!"

"Okay, new plan! I don't really have great control with my magic, but I'm pretty sure I can blow up the sharks!" Sunset started charging a spell. She could do this. She just had to be confident.

"Stop right there, criminal scum!" Yelled a voice from the shadows. Sunset's spell went wild with the distraction, a beam of heat cutting through the rope holding Cadance up.

The pink princess screamed and fell, until her fall was abruptly halted by a floating, glowing mattress below her, complete with wings. Filly-Second untied her in an instant, helping her stand.

"I've got you!" Radiance said, the mattress flying away from the shark tank, carrying Cadance to safety, dropping her off behind the Power Ponies.

"Okay, wow, didn't think I'd be glad to see you idiots," Sunset sighed. "Thank you. Did you know nothing here is labeled?" She laughed nervously. "It's probably a safety code violation."

"That's not the only law you've broken, evil-doer!" Masked Matter-horn fired a white beam into the air, making the lasers rebound on themselves and short out.

"What was that?" Sunset asked, blinking in confusion.

"A mirror beam!" Masked Matter-horn declared, proudly. "I know ninety-nine secret magical techniques. Maybe if you'd stayed in school instead of pursing a life of crime, you'd understand how impressive that is."

"Wow, a whole ninety-nine spells," Sunset scoffed. "That's not what I meant at all. I meant that you can't make an energy ray that reflects light. It's just not physically possible."

"It's magic," Masked Matter-horn said.

"Magic has rules," Sunset said.

"And you'd break those too, no doubt," Zapp said, rushing forwards to strike Sunset with a hoof crackling with lightning. Sunset tried to put up a shield, but only succeeded in firing another bolt of energy, Zapp deflecting it with her hoof before punching Sunset hard enough to send her back into the shark tank.

"Ow," Sunset said. "Will you knock it off? I'm not trying to hurt anypony! If you'd all just shut up and listen for a few minutes–"

"You think we'll listen when we found the Mayor's precious daughter about to be turned into chum?" Mistress Mare-velous asked, limping on her wounded leg. "I think you deserve a taste of your own medicine."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Sunset asked, wary. A shadow loomed behind her. For a moment, she thought that a pony had gotten behind her. That was true, but the shadow was actually being cast by the shark tank, which Saddle Rager was holding over her head.

"SMASH!" Saddle Rager yelled, slamming it down on Sunset. In a blur of concussive force, water, and flopping fish, Sunset passed out.

Sunset groaned, rolling over. Her muzzle felt like it was broken, and everything smelled like fish. Worse, water had gotten into her stupid costume and was making an awful squelching sound every time she moved.

"Revenge sounds pretty good now," Sunset mumbled. "I think I'm starting to appreciate why bad guys keep coming around for another go."

She tried to stand up, and found that was going to be rather difficult with the hoofcuff attaching her to the hospital bed. She instinctively fired up her horn to free herself, and a jolt of pain rushed through her body.

"Awesome. Restraining rings exist here too," she whimpered.

"Let me guess, you're in here for jaywalking," groused a voice from across the room. Sunset opened her eyes and tried to focus through her pounding headache. She was in a prison cell. One that was remarkably clean, almost like it had only been created today, fresh concrete and steel bars gleaming in the low light.

In the cell across from her, a dark form glared through the shadows.

"Do I know you?" Sunset asked.

"No. Not in this time, or this place," it said. Sunset couldn't quite make it out. There was something wrong about it. The form didn't look equine at all. She could see glowing teal eyes, suggestions of dark wings like a bat's.

"What the hay is that supposed to mean?" Sunset asked. Before the other shape could answer, there was a commotion down the hall. Sunset turned to look and saw something that effectively eliminated anything she was thinking, forcing it out of her head through sheer surprise.

Nightmare Moon was wearing a suit and being dragged down the hallway by two ponies in police uniforms. The dark alicorn sported a small goatee, her pinstripe suit immaculately pressed.

"Nightmare Moon!" Sunset waved. "Hey! I already found Cadance! We need to get out of here before-"

"Do I know you?" Nightmare Moon asked.

"Come on, Deputy Mayor Luna," one of the officers said. "Stop stalling. You're due to be arraigned in a few hours anyway."

"Deputy Mayor? Luna?" Sunset blinked.

"Hard to imagine that somepony like her would be caught embezzling the city's entire trust fund of daylight savings," one of the officers said, lingering near the bars while Nightmare Moon was led away. "And the worst part is, I voted for her!"

"I think I'm going crazy..." Sunset muttered, sitting down heavily.

"That's good," the officer noted. "Maybe it means you'll go to Arkhoof Asylum instead of the Royal Prison! They can get you some real help. My brother went there after he started wearing a costume made out of old calendars and committing crimes every holiday. Now he sells insurance!"

"How is that better?"

"Ponies need insurance."

"No, I meant how is it better than prison?"

"Better food. And you might be able to escape." The police pony winked. "I hear they can't even keep Distraction in there, and she's only seven."

"Distraction?" Sunset blinked, getting even more bewildered. A filly ran past the cage, throwing confetti into the air.

"Hey!" The police pony yelled, giving chase.

Sunset looked across the hallway to the other cell. Nothing was in it. She curled up around herself, suddenly cold.

"Oh my little girl, I'm so glad you're back!" Mayor Celestia said, hugging Cadance so hard Cadance thought she heard some of her bones start to creak and bend. The mayor's office smelled like cigar smoke and old books, both of which were pumped into the room since Mayor Celestia neither smoked nor read. She preferred to drink cake-flavored moonshine and play baseball, the greatest Equestrian sport.

"What your father means to say is that he's very glad that you're safe and that you haven't been injured," Raven supplied, holding up a stack of forms. "If you'd please sign all of these forms, Miss Cadance, we can finish the process of having the so-called Nuclear Nag charged with assault, battery, kidnapping, sharknapping, cruelty to animals, and communism."

"Father?" Cadance asked, confused.

"Yes?" Celestia asked. Cadance looked at the alicorn. And her giant, bushy beard. She decided that, with everything else going on this one point probably wasn't worth causing a scene over. Thankfully, Celestia misinterpreted her look as meaning something completely different. "Oh, yes, I see. Of course. Raven, have those brought along later. My baby girl just got back and she's been traumatized. Simply traumatized!"

"Right. Yes." Cadance agreed. "Also confused."

"That's part of being traumatized," Celestia assured her.

"I'd really like to know what's going on. Especially with Sunset Shimmer."

"Sunset Shimmer?" Celestia looked at Raven.

"That's what the Nuclear Nag was calling herself," Raven supplied. "It's probably another fake alias. According to the official Heroes Handbook, Nuclear Nag does not in fact have a secret identity and was created in space as a clone of Masked Matter-horn as one of the secret, evil schemes of her arch nemesis and twin, Lux Lightbringer."

"Ah yes, well, there you go then," Mayor Celestia said. "That seems to have cleared things up quite a bit."

"Not really. Not at all, in fact!" Cadance huffed. "I think there's been a mistake. I'm not–"

"Mayor? It's time for the press conference," Raven reminded him, checking her watch.

"We'll talk about it later, dear," Celestia said. "You're very important and beloved, and that's why I don't have time to talk about your feelings with you. We need to go meet the press."

"I can't-"

"Of course, you're right," Celestia agreed. "Not without makeup."

"Actually, Mayor, polls say that going without makeup immediately after a kidnapping helps show how serious the situation was," Raven said. "Given the charges involved, we need to put on a good show for the press."

"I don't know what I'd do without you, Raven," Celestia said. She pulled Cadance along with her as they walked out of the office and through a curtain to find themselves on a stage in front of Town Hall. Cadance blinked in surprise. Hadn't the office been on the second floor of the building? How had they gotten outside to the stage?

"Mister Mayor!" One of the reporters hopped up from her seat, waving a notebook in the air. "Is it true your daughter has been replaced by an almost-identical counterpart from a mirror universe?"

Celestia smiled as she stepped up to the podium to answer. "That's a very interesting question. And my answer is, of course, that a father knows her daughter. If she was from a mirror universe she'd probably have some kind of crazy belief like black being white, up being down, or communism being a legitimate form of government. Next question."

"Can Miss Cadance comment on her recent kidnapping at the hooves of the infamous Nuclear Nag, who is best known for having once destroyed Coastal City while fighting the West Coast Power Ponies in Issue 67?"

"Of course she can!" Mayor Celestia looked at Cadance. Raven pushed her up to the podium.

"Um, hello?" Cadance started. The audience applauded and cheered. She felt embarrassed. Celestia - Princess Celestia, not this bizarro Mayor version - had given her dozens of lessons on public speaking. And she'd led with 'um hello' like a foal.

"Go ahead, sweetie," Celestia said, encouraging.

"I think that this has all been a big mistake," Cadance said, carefully.

The crowd waited for her to pause, then broke out into cheers again. That was strange. She frowned a little.

"I don't think Sunset S- The Nuclear Nag meant to hurt anypony. I think something very strange is going on."

The crowd cheered even louder.

"Everypony, please, this is important! She didn't kidnap me! There's a creature called Discord, and he's going to destroy Equestria unless we can stop him!"

The blank-faced smiles and cheers she was met with would have been enough to wake the dead.

"None of you are even listening, are you?" She whispered.

They cheered for that, too.

She stepped down from the podium to more cheers, and Mayor Celestia took her place.

"Well, you heard her," Celestia said. "She's very tired and glad to be back home where she's loved. Once she's had some time to recover we can discuss exclusive interviews, but only if you can be polite." She winked. "I know some of you fillies and colts have been wanting to ask her out on a date, but I already told her she has to wait until she's sixteen."

"I'm thirty-five," Cadance grumbled. Nopony noticed.

Mayor Celestia waved, her aides handing out flyers to remind ponies to vote for her in the upcoming election, and the press conference seemed to end as she pushed Cadance off of the stage with Raven's help.

"That went well," Mayor Celestia said. "I'm just glad you're such a natural public speaker, honey!"

"I'm not- they were just cheering no matter what I said!"

"Well that's because everypony loves you," Mayor Celestia reminded her, patting her head.

"And none of them were listening to anything I was saying."

"Dear, it's not about what you say, it's about how you say it," Celestia said. "You just keep smiling and waving for the camera and you let your dad take care of all those hard political decisions, eh? Maybe once you're older you can start thinking about being part of a campus political club."

"A conservative one," Raven noted. "Many of the liberal groups have strong communist leanings."

"Of course, right," Celestia agreed. "Don't want to get caught up with all those bad influences like communists and gryphon-right activists and conscientious objectors."

"You're not even listening to me now," Cadance mumbled.

"And don't think I haven't noticed how you've been looking at that Flash Sentry," Mayor Celestia said. "Good kid. Hoofball star champion. Did I ever told you how I used to play hoofball in college? University of Gothoof, best team in the nation - don't let the Maretropolis Mashers hear that, though!"

"Look, I need to go talk to Sunset," Cadance said. "You just keep... mayoring or whatever."

"The Nuclear Nag is going to be executed," Raven noted. "I'm afraid she isn't going to be allowed to have any visitors until then."

"Executed?!" Cadance gasped, paling.

"It's the sharknapping charge," Mayor Celestia said. "Assault and battery is one thing, and massive property damage is just a misdemeanor, but sharks are the symbol of our great nation and we cannot allow cruelty to such beautiful animals."

"You- that's insane!" Cadance sputtered.

"I know," Celestia said. "To think anypony would put a shark in a tank when they deserve to roam through the streams and parks of Equestria freely. The two the Power Ponies saved are already on the way to a shark nursery and rehabilitation center to be given massages and spa treatments."

"It's very good for their skin," Raven noted.

Cadance braced herself on the sink in the small bathroom, trying to catch her breath. The whole world was insane. Every time it started to make sense, it turned and twisted itself like a bad dream.

She looked into the mirror. Her reflection's expression twisted into a smile.

"You look like you're having a bad day," it said.

Cadance's eyes went wide. The door to the bathroom opened and she glanced over at Raven.

"We still need to get those forms signed," Raven said, holding up a stack of papers.

Cadance looked back to the mirror. The reflection seemed normal again. She was in an insane world. Maybe she needed an insane solution to her problems. There was one thing that always worked in the comics...

"Can I borrow your glasses for a moment?" Cadance asked.

"Why?" Raven asked, taking them off any giving them to her anyway.

"What's that over there?" Cadance asked, pointing. Raven looked. While she was facing the other direction, Cadance put the glasses on.

Raven looked around in confusion. "Cadance? Where did you go?" She looked at the pink pony. "Miss, did you see where Cadance went?"

"She flew south for the winter," Cadance said. "Which way is the jail?"

"It's right underneath town hall, in the dungeon level," Raven said.

"Thanks!" Cadance waved and skipped away in her perfect disguise.

Sunset threw the red ball against the brick wall. It bounced against the wall, against the floor, and then she caught it again. She wasn't sure where it had come from. It and a harmonica had just sort of appeared when she wasn't looking, and she wasn't about to put her lips on a strange harmonica that she just found lying around.

"Sunset!" Somepony whispered. Sunset looked up, expecting to see the strange shadowy shape across the hall. Instead, she saw Cadance, looking surprisingly cute in a new pair of glasses.

"Oh my. I like the innocent schoolgirl look," Sunset said. "Please tell me you have a key."

"I have a key," Cadance said, holding up a golden key as big as her head. "I stole it from Celestia's desk."

"Princess Celestia had a key to my cell in her desk?" Sunset repeated, slowly.

"Well, it says it's the key to the city, so it must be some kind of skeleton key," Cadance said. She held it so Sunset could see the engraving on the side.

"Cadance, there's no way that's going to work. It's just a symbolic..." Sunset trailed off as Cadance slid the key into the lock and turned, the cell door opening. "...just a symboic gesture of trust..." Sunset muttered, amazed.

"I know it doesn't make sense," Cadance said. "Nothing here has been making sense." She slid the restrictor ring from Sunset's horn. Sunset motioned for her to get back and charged up a spell, her body crackling with energy and heat before she discharged a sweeping line of energy that cut the hoofcuffs free of the bed.

"This has to be some trick of Discord's," Sunset said. "He must have restricted my magic so I couldn't do anything useful to get us out of here."

"Just as we suspected. The Nuclear Nag had a henchmare all along!" The voice boomed with the tones of heroic justice, only a few degrees removed from the Royal Canterlot Voice. Sunset gently pushed Cadance aside and looked down the hallway.
Masked Matter-horn stood there, horn already glowing, along with Filly-Second and Zapp. Sunset looked back the other way. At the other end of the hallway, Radiance had manifested a giant pair of hoofcuffs and stood at the ready with Mistress Mare-velous and Saddle Rager. She was surrounded.

"Cadance," Sunset said, calmly. "Would you say that it's unlikely any of this is actually real?"

"Who are you talking to, villain?" Zapp demanded. "Cadance is with Mayor Celestia!"

Cadance rolled her eyes and took off the glasses. As one, the Power Ponies gasped in surprise as she revealed her identity.

"The Mayor's beloved daughter!" Radiance yelled, in surprise.

"Dat awful Nuclear Nag musta done somethin' to her mind!" Filly-Second said. "We gotta stop dis mook!"

"There's no way any of this can be real," Cadance said. "Things don't even fit together right. It's all like a stage. Why is the jail right under town hall? Why would they put a hospital bed in a prison cell?"

"That's what I thought, too," Sunset agreed. "I used to read the Power Ponies comics when I was a filly. This is just like them. Things just keep moving along, and little details get dropped. Why doesn't Mistress Mare-velous have an injured hoof anymore? How did they get here so quickly? Even if they'd been waiting for me to try and escape, you would have seen them on the way here - it's a straight hallway with no other way out!"

"Justice always finds a way, villain," Zapp said. "Surrender and return to your cell and perhaps we will-"

Sunset blasted Zapp back, the bars of the cells ahead of her melting just from the proximity to her magical attack, distorting and dripping like candles.

"You know, it's been a long time since I could really cut loose," Sunset said. "Every day in Canterlot I have to keep my temper under control, I have to make sure I don't break anything or anypony. I used to go out hunting monsters just to relax a little, because if I lost control for even a moment, somepony could die." Sunset grinned, her eyes starting to glow with golden light. "But here, where nothing is real? Where you aren't real? I don't need to hold back."

"Uh, Sunset?" Cadance whispered. "I'm still real."

"You're probably immortal."

"I really don't want to test that, Sunset!"

Sunset stomped a hoof, and the floor shattered. A toss of her head sent a blinding white fireball at Radiance, who created a brick wall that evaporated under the assault. She screamed as she vanished in the heat and flame.

"Radiance!" Masked Matter-horn yelled.

"I'm done-" Sunset said, as Saddle Rager, already huge and roaring, jumped at her through the flames. "-playing by the rules!" She shoved with her magic, sending Saddle Rager into the other group, Matter-horn's spell striking her in the back and freezing the enraged pony in a block of ice.

Filly-second punched her, dodging out of the way of an attack before Sunset even had the spell fully formed, hitting her from the other side. Blows rained down on her like a hailstorm, each of them individually weak but taking its toll.

Sunset struck out with a hoof, Filly-second dodging easily, letting the clawed hoof slip past her, missing by inches. She realized her mistake a moment too late. Energy flared from Sunset's hoof, a blinding burst of light that didn't need to hit her directly. Filly-second stumbled blindly on the broken ground, until Sunset set off an explosion at the Power Pony's hooves.

Bits of costume rained down, nothing left of the speedster except scraps of fabric.

"Wow, half the team and I've barely worked up a sweat!" Sunset said.

"Thou hath slain ponies and laugh about it?!" Zapp demanded, eyes crackling with lightning as she flew back into the hallway, one wing blackened and an eye swollen shut.

"Get over it," Sunset snorted. "I know how this goes. They'll be back within a year. Ponies never seem to stay dead in-" She was cut off as a noose tightened around her neck.

"You'll pay for this!" Mare-velous growled, trying to drag Sunset down to the ground.

Cadance grabbed the rope, keeping Mare-velous from strangling Sunset.

"Get out of the way, Cadance! She's a killer!" Matter-horn yelled. "I don't know what kind of hold she has on you, but fight it!"

The noose around Sunset's neck loosened, moving like a snake and wrapping around her legs.

"I've got her!" Mare-velous said. A loop of rope trussed Cadance's legs as well, knocking the pink alicorn to the ground. "I hope you've got something planned!"

"There is only one course we can take," Zapp said. She raised her amulet up.

"You sure about that, Aurora?" Sunset asked. Zapp faltered before she could bring her powers to bear.

"How did you-" Zapp whispered.

"I've got a pretty good memory. Even better than Trot Summers' over there." She glanced at Matter-horn, who paled in surprise. "What, you're not used to having ponies know your identities? Mare-velous doesn't even really have one, but I could point out the lost continent of Alfalfis on a map if you want."

"She must be using mind spells on us!" Matter-horn yelled. "Like how she affected Cadance, the Mayor's beloved daughter!"

"Stop saying that!" Cadance huffed. "I'm more than just Celestia's adopted daughter!" She struggled against her bonds. "I'm not a pawn or a damsel in distress..." Cadance kicked a hoof free as Mare-velous approached, catching her in the jaw. The animated rope slackened.

"Guess that makes you a bad girl like me," Sunset winked, helping Cadance up.

"I won't let you get away with this," Matter-horn said. "I don't know how you corrupted her, and how you know so much about us, but it ends now." Purple energy swirled around her horn, black dots swarming like angry bees. "The Professor said I should never use this spell, but I can't let a murderer like you remain in this-"

Sunset fired a blast through Matter-horn's, well, horn, shattering it. Before Masked Matter-horn could even scream, the spell consumed her utterly.

"Die, monster!" Zapp screamed, charging. Sunset blasted her into the sky with another burst of heat and force, Zapp vanishing into the blue.

"That was-" Cadance whispered. "I mean, I know they're not real, but-"

"We need to keep moving," Sunset said, grabbing her hoof and running outside. They burst through double-doors and were suddenly out of Town Hall, barricades strewn in a wide semicircle around them.

"Stop right there, criminal scum!"

"But that voice-" Cadance whispered. The Power Ponies were there. All six of them.

"Nopony ever seems to die for long in comics," Sunset said. "I thought we'd be able to manage more than a few minutes, though."

"You can never defeat the Power Ponies!" Masked Matter-horn declared. "Now we'll use our secret weapon!"

"Brace yourself!" Sunset hissed. "I don't know if I can manage a shield. All my magic seems to do is blow things up."

"Hooftess Fruit Pies!" Masked Matter-horn yelled.

"What?" Sunset asked, her jaw dropping. Filly-second used that moment of surprise to put a fried pie in her mouth. Sunset bit into it. It was filled with sweet lemon creme.

"By the gods of my native land, there is no greater bounty than Hooftess Fruit Pies!" Zapp said, holding up an apple pie.

"W-what?!" Cadance asked, as Radiance dumped a load of assorted, wrapped pies on her.

"Evil is no match for the delicious flavor! Now in black cherry!" Saddle Rager said. The crowd cheered, pastries flowing like water as the entire city started to celebrate.

"Sunset, what's going on?" Cadance whispered.

"Don't ask me. The pies aren't even that good." Sunset spat out the half of the pie she hadn't swallowed. There was a gasp from the crowd, ponies staring at her like she was some kind of monster.

"She cannot be beaten!" Zapp wailed. "Even pies have no effect!"

"Maybe if we try Twinkies?" Mistress Mare-velous suggested.

"No, I think it's clear that even our strongest attacks will have no effect," Matter-horn sighed. "The world is doomed."

[Suddenly...]

"What was that?" Sunset blinked. "You heard that, right?"

"Where did that voice come from?" Cadance asked, looking around. Sunset pushed her to the side as lead slugs slammed into the ground around them, the pavement shattering.

"ALL YOU POOZERS BETTER GET READY FOR PAIN!" Shouted a pony in black, carrying an absurdly large weapon.

"What in the hay is that?!" Cadance gasped.

"Mistress Mare-velous," Sunset said, grimly. "There was a grim time in comics when everything had to be extreme and gritty. It was why I stopped reading them."

There was a chime in the air, and a second Masked Matter-horn appeared, this one with wings and a flowing mane like a miniature Celestia.

"And that was from the stupid Celestial War event where the Masked Matter-horn became an alicorn for like two issues before the new writer changed it back."

"What?" Cadance blinked.

"Time-travel arc. Her evil twin made a wish with Tirek for power, and Masked Matter-horn had to give up her immortality to- it was a bad story arc, okay? The details aren't important." Sunset huffed. "They ruined all the characters."

"More keep showing up!" Cadance pointed at where teenaged versions of the Power Ponies jumped over the barricades.

"It's like some kind of-"

[Crisis on Infinite Equestrias!]

"Yeah, that," Sunset muttered.

"All of time and space will come here to defeat you, Nuclear Nag!" One of the Filly-seconds said. Sunset wasn't quite sure which version it was, but it didn't sound like Marey Allen. Maybe Filly Fast?

[Nuclear Nag knew she didn't stand a chance against so many brave heroes, and surrendered.]

"Oh buck that," Sunset said, charging up a spell.

[Her magic had no effect!]

She threw her whole might behind it, the wave of destruction crashing through the assembled ranks of heroes and into the city beyond, a skyscraper collapsing in a cloud of dust.

The Power Ponies on the ground were bleeding black, magenta, cyan, and yellow. Cadance sniffed. It didn't smell like blood. It smelled like...

"Ink," Cadance said. "They're bleeding ink."

[Nuclear Nag returned to her secret lair, readying a new evil plot!]

"I think that voice is coming from that way," Cadance pointed back towards town hall."

[She ignored the strange voice, because she had better things to do. Wealth! Respect! Power! Maybe even love! All of those were back at her lair, and the voice wasn't really important.]

"I think you're right," Sunset agreed, tossing another spell over her shoulder. She didn't bother looking at the resulting blast.

[At least she knows cool mares don't look at explosions.]

Sunset followed Cadance as they ran into Town Hall, the building an impossible sprawl of stairwells and doorways.

[The two went right-]

Cadance jerked to the left, through a break room. Two surprised ponies yelled in annoyance as she spilled their coffees.

[And then up the stairs-]

Cadance picked a door at random.

[And stopped ignoring the story! They could be very happy and maybe even get an interesting ending! Maybe Sunset Shimmer becomes an alicorn! All the kids love princesses!]

"The door won't open," Cadance said.

"Good, that means it's the right way," Sunset said, blasting it down. Inside was a white corridor, impossibly long.

[Or maybe they have a threesome with Shining Armor!]

"I am going to tear this whole world down," Sunset growled.

[All they have to do is follow the rules and turn back!]

"Buck your rules!" Sunset yelled. The corridor's walls seemed to shatter, and they fell into darkness. The fall lasted forever, and it lasted a moment. It spanned worlds, and the thickness of a page. The silence encompassed infinity and was contained within the period at the end of this sentence.

They landed on a somewhat worn, faded carpet and the sound of a typewriter.

"You know, most ponies like to think that the whole world is planned out," Discord said, as he tapped the keys. He didn't look up at the unicorn and alicorn as they picked themselves off the carpet. "They like to think they've got a destiny in store for them. That's what those booty marks are all about, right?"

"Where's Midnight?" Sunset demanded. Her horn started to glow. Discord put a talon to her lips, shushing her, and the spell cut off.

"She's perfectly safe with Twilight, but you won't know for sure for another few chapters," Discord said. "You know, I didn't think anything could cause as much chaos as I do, but those two come pretty darn close."

"What do you want?" Cadance asked.

"I want to have fun, play with my little ponies a bit-" he held up a plastic copy of Celestia, brushing her mane with a tiny comb. "I don't know how Sunbutt keeps all of you playing by the rules. Do I need to eat more cake?"

"If you don't bring my daughter back here, so help me, I'll-"

"You'll what?" Discord asked, his voice chilly. "Cast a spell?" He snapped his talons, and Sunset's horn vanished. "I've been polite so far because I was hoping you'd see things my way. You threw this little world into chaos! I'm so proud!" Discord sniffled and wiped a fake tear from his eye.

Sunset grabbed his typewriter and threw it across the room, papers flying into the air.

"I'm not going to play your stupid games!" Sunset snapped.

"Careful!" Discord warned. "That's your story right there."

Cadance caught one of the fluttering pages. As she read it, she felt dread crawl up her spine. What would happen if she read ahead?

["I'm not going to play your stupid games!" Sunset snapped.
"Careful!" Discord warned. "That's your story right there."
Cadance caught one of the fluttering pages. As she read it, she felt dread crawl up her spine. What would happen if she read ahead?]

"Sunset," Cadance said, carefully. "I think-"

"I think it's my best work," Discord said. "What could be better? Worlds within worlds, each with their own brand of chaos! It's just fanfiction, but I had pathos, humor, sharks, all the important elements of a story." He leaned in to whisper. "I'll tell you what, how about we start over, but this time I'll make you the newest member of the Power Ponies? Personally I think you make a better villain, but I'm willing to accomodate you. I could even make you an alicorn."

"I have a counter-proposal," Sunset said. She grabbed the stack of paper in her hooves and started tearing.

"Wait!" Discord yelled. "We're almost at the good part!"

"Oh yeah?" Sunset asked, ripping the last page out of the typewriter. "Well I think you need an editor!" The page and

world fell

apart

Chapter 26

Since the dawn of time, what has separated people of all shapes and sizes and species from mere animals has been their use of tools and intelligence to solve problems. A beast would fight a world it could not understand with tooth and claw, and a person would seek to understand it and find or craft the tools needed to tame the wild world.

The first tools were made of rock and bone and wood, and these were the same materials that Midnight had to work with today. Minus the bone and wood. The point was that she had a lot of rocks and there were problems that needed solving.

The most important problem, as far as she could tell, was that she was chained to some of those rocks.

Certainly the fact that she didn't know where she was, or why her magic wasn't working, were also problems. But she couldn't start to solve those problems until she'd solved the problem at hoof. Very directly at hoof, since the iron cuff was wrapped around it, the chain joining that to an iron ring set into a boulder too heavy for her to budge.

"Okay. Let's look at our options," Midnight said to herself. "I have a few rocks-" She looked at the pile she'd managed to gather from the rocky plateau around her. They ranged from the size of her head to pebbles. "And I need to escape from... this place."

She looked up. She couldn't see the sky. There was a distant suggestion of a roof overhead, so far in the distance it was lost to gloomy haze. The terrain around her was something like mountain peaks jutting out of a boulder field, the only flat ground provided by ledges of rock. She was chained halfway between the peak of one of those spires and the boulders below, on a ledge along a narrow path leading to the top.

"So!" She coughed, refocusing. "I can try to break this cuff, which seems difficult. I can try and find a weak link in the chain. I can try and pry the ring free from where it was hammered into the lock. Or I can break my leg."

Midnight considered all those options and immediately discarded the last one.

"I think I'll look for a weak link first." She tugged on the chain. Midnight wasn't entirely sure how one found the weakest link in a chain. Presumably there was some methodology she could use. If she had access to her magic she could scan them for flaws. Of course if she had access to her magic she could also have freed herself in seconds.

Midnight couldn't really see a difference between the links. She adjusted her glasses to get a better look and abruptly realized she had an additional tool at hoof.

"A little metal, some glass..." She muttered, thinking. She turned the cuff around until she found what she was looking for, an oblong hole, right next to a barely-visible seam in the dark iron of the cuff.

Midnight took off her glasses and sacrificed them for the greater good, snapping the arms off the frames to give herself two twists of wire. A few minutes work with the rocks, and they were somewhat flattened on one end. Picking a lock manually, with no use of magic at all even to hold the picks, wasn't something Midnight had ever tried to learn. Her only advantage was that she knew a few spells that would do the trick, and she'd learned a lot about locks as part of learning the spells themselves. One couldn't use Bastion's Bar Buster against a rotary pin lock, after all, and if you didn't know how an encapturment mechanism worked you'd never manage to master the most basic safecracking spells.

A few minutes of work turned into an hour, then a second, edging its way towards a third before Midnight finally managed to get the lock opened, more by brute force and luck than any sort of skill. Still, she was free, the cuff opening, a hidden hinge giving her enough freedom to get her hoof free.

"Well, that's the first part of my grand escape plan from..." She looked around. Without her glasses, now it was not only gloomy and grey, but blurry. "I have no idea where I am."

"Tartarus, unfortunately," Twilight said. She limped around a boulder. Her own cuff was still around her hoof, trailing a length of chain that dragged behind her with every step.

"I can get that," Midnight offered, waving her over. "How'd you get free?"

"The ring holding the chain to the rocks was poorly designed. It was just driven into the stone, and didn't go all the way through." Twilight turned her hoof to let Midnight work on the lock. "There was no way to really secure it, so I was able to get free with a little work."

"Mostly free," Midnight said. It was a lot less awkward working from this angle, and not having to hold one pick in her mouth. It still took almost a quarter of an hour to get Twilight free, the other unicorn rubbing her fetlock where the cuff had dug into her skin.

"Much better," Twilight said. "Thanks."

"So what's this about us being in Tartarus?" Midnight asked. "I don't remember us doing anything bad enough to end up there." She paused. "Unless freeing Nightmare Moon counts. It doesn't count, does it?"

"Trust me, I know Tartarus when I see it," Twilight noted, grimly. "I did a paper on Tartarus once. It's not a nice place. We're basically on the inside of a huge sphere. If you walk far enough in any one direction you end up back where you came from."

"What happens if you dig down?" Midnight asked, curious.

"Good question! If you dig far enough through the rock you come up again on the opposite side of the sphere where you started, assuming you went straight down. If you dig at an angle the effects vary as you'd expect, like the map of the sphere reverse-projected onto itself with an invariant distance between the surfaces."

Midnight considered that for a moment. "So no matter what angle you dig at, you can only go so far before you reach the other side."

"Right. There's a gravitational discontinuity, apparently. There haven't been a lot of scholarly studies. Mostly just from grad students really desperate to get funding."

"Can you use your magic?" Midnight asked.

"You think I'd have walked for an hour with fifty kilos of chain dragging from my hoof if I could use magic?" Twilight asked.

"I concede the point. So how do we get out of Tartarus?" Midnight asked. "You've clearly studied it more than I have."

"There are apparently two points that allow travel in and out of Tartarus-"

"The poles," Midnight guessed. Twilight nodded. "It's like a giant vector trap. All paths outwards bend back inside. But how does it stay stable- oh. Our magic." She sighed. "We can't use magic because the vector trap drains it. Very efficient."

"Put a few prisoners in and the prison fuels itself," Twilight agreed.

"Any idea how to find the poles?" Midnight asked.

"I was hoping you'd know," Twilight said.

"Listen for barking in three-part harmony?" Midnight offered.

"Okay, we can figure this out. We're the two smartest mares in this entire dimension, presumably. All we have to do is come up with a way to determine the polar nodes of a sphereoid from the inside with few or no tools."

Midnight stood up and started pacing. "Where's all the light coming from? There's no sun or moon, so it should be pitch black."

"Oh! That's a good starting point!" Twilight looked around. "I don't see a point source, but with the mist and gloom, it might just be difficult to determine, like when the sun shines through a thick layer of clouds."

"Right. Then things are still lit, but it's diffused so much that you can't tell where it's coming from." Midnight nodded.

"But what we can do is, we can follow the shadows," Twilight said.

"If nothing else, it should lead us somewhere," Midnight agreed.

"I remember reading that given average values for humidity and dust, the maximum distance we can see through the atmosphere is about twenty kilometers," Twilight noted. "Since we can just barely see the other side of the sphere, we could assume it's a sphere around that size."

"So if we're able to follow a straight path, it would be less than thirty two kilometers," Midnight muttered, thinking to herself. "Over very rough terrain. It could take days to get there!"

"Right, but on average it's more like half that distance," Twilight said. "We could triangulate the exact distance using our shadows..."

"Without a level. On the inside of a sphere with an unknown diameter. Where the light might not even be a point source and we don't have a compass." Midnight snorted. "Great plan, Twilight."

"Fine. I was hoping to have some idea of how far we'd have to go, but go ahead and shoot the messenger."

"There's an easier way," Midnight said. "The ratio of shadow length to body height. If the light is at the north pole, the shadow at the south pole is zero length because the light is directly overhead. At the equator, it will be exactly at the length of the occluding object's height."

"We'd need two objects with exactly the same size."

"Like us?" Midnight suggested. She got down on the ground next to Twilight and tried to mimic her pose as best she could. Twilight's shadow was slightly longer than she was tall.

"Ah! Lucky break!" Twilight said. "We're above the equator, then. Not really far above it, but that means we have less than a 16-kilometer trip."

"Granted, we're assuming the light is coming from the way out," Midnight noted while she stood. "It could be that the exit is at the south pole."

"Well, look at it this way," Twilight said. "The north pole is a little closer."

"How did you find me so quickly, anyway?" Midnight said, as she started walking, generally in the direction of the presumed light source and exit and more specifically in the direction of the nearest path through the broken rocks and spires of twisted stone, having to jump over a few gaps

"I could just feel you," Twilight said. "Even though we can't use magic, I guess we're still connected."

"That's going to be real awkward if either of us decides to start dating again."

"Not as awkward as Princess Cadance trying to manipulate us into dating," Twilight gagged.

"Pink Mom is like that," Midnight sighed. "She ships more than the entire royal post office."

"You know, we got free kinda easily, didn't we?" Twilight asked.

"Yeah," Midnight said, shrugging as she easily hopped a gap that her twin struggled to manage. Years of dance classes had made her light on her hooves.

"So, presumably..."

"Presumably there are a bunch of monsters running loose," Midnight said. "I know. I'm trying really hard not to think about that." She reached out a hoof and helped Twilight across a crack in the rock that led down into impenetrable darkness. It was probably just her imagination making her think she saw something moving in the shadows.

The ground shifted under them, the rock collapsing into mud. It didn’t even have the decency to crack or shatter like natural stone - one moment it was solid, and the next they were falling into a chasm because they were standing on mud that had decided to take them for a ride.

Midnight screamed. Twilight screamed. Several faceless things in the dark screamed. It was a bad time.

Most ponies would be satisfied that they were able to appreciate a landing at all after a fall into a dark, screaming chasm. It was understandable, though, that Twilight was still unhappy about landing relatively unharmed after finding that she’d fallen onto, and broken through, a thick crust of dust over oozing mud.

“Oh it just keeps getting worse,” Twilight said, sneezing. "Where are we?"

"Tartarus, I'm afraid," said a smooth voice from the darkness. "Still Tartarus. Even further from the light than you were before."

The clouds of dust were pushed aside as a goat's skull, skin pulled tight around it and the eyes empty sockets with dancing flames floating within, pushed through to look at Midnight and Twilight. It coughed, and bells rang from the array around its neck.

"You two must have been very naughty ponies to get sent here," it said.

"Who are you?" Twilight asked, backing away.

"You can call me Grogar," he said, grinning in the way only a skull can grin. "I'm so glad to have guests."

"Grogar?" Midnight whispered, hooves slipping in the mud covering the ground. "I read about you in the forbidden section of the archives. You're a necromancer."

"Was a necromancer," Grogar said, his voice hollow. With no lips or tongue to form the words, they just hung in the air. "The retirement plan does not involve gold watches and walks on the beach." He sneered at the two ponies, flickering flames looking between them.

"We don't want any trouble," Twilight said. With the river of slush at her back, all she could do was edge to the side, trying to circle around Grogar and hoping Midnight would follow.

"Then why did you come here with your disgusting flesh?" Grogar grumbled, the words slicing through the air like the constant, cold breeze, not quite enough to be a wind, just barely there, a whisper of chill to take any comfort away.

Grogar slammed a skeletal hoof down into the muck and pulled a pony out of the ground like a magician doing the rabbit trick. The pony was half-mummified, blackened and leathery like the peat mummies they occasionally found in Trottingham.

"This one..." Grogar sniffed. "Unicornian mage. Bathed in the blood of virgins as part of a ritual to grant herself eternal youth." He scoffed and twisted, tearing her apart, tossing her aside.

Midnight winced as the head landed at her feet, the eye moving slightly to follow her before it sank back into the muck and out of sight.

"She's still alive..." Midnight gasped.

"Immortal," Grogar corrected. "Disgusting. Death is clean. Flesh is... slow rot and decay."

“Look, we’re not supposed to be here,” Twilight said. “We just want to find the way out.”

"You don't belong," Grogar said. "Not with that hideous life. A constant roil of decay and growth and rot that only ends when you finally fall and the world strips you bare down to the clean, white bone." He stalked towards them, skeletal legs somehow staying on top of the dust, like the goat was no more than a ghost.

"I think it's time for the Sparkle Family secret maneuver," Twilight said.

"Gonna have to fill me in on that one," Midnight hissed. "Some kind of special Royal Guard training from your brother?"

"No, it's something my mom taught me. Whenever she was outmatched or outnumbered by an opponent, she'd use the same special technique to take care of it." Twilight braced herself, watching Grogar for a moment, then broke into a sprint. "Cheese it!"

Midnight chased after her, looking back over her shoulder at the goat as he stalked after them at a walking pace, soon vanishing into the grey shadows of the dust they were throwing up as they fled.

"How are we supposed to find the way out?" Midnight asked, as she loped after Twilight, quickly catching up with her slower twin. Mud splattered on their coats, covering them up nearly to their necks.

"I know!" Twilight snapped. "Tartarus is more complex than the abstracts suggested! It's not like I studied it in detail!" " Twilight huffed. "We can circle back around it and slip by! That thing wasn't going very quickly, so we can avoid him if we keep moving."

"Good plan," Midnight agreed.

“That looks safe,” Midnight said. The chasm helpfully ended in a cliff. Someone had been thoughtful enough to add a bridge. It was just slightly wider than her hoof, made of rocks fitted together without mortar, and covered in moss, mold, slime, lichen, and, generally speaking, disgusting and unsafe at the same time.

“Mm.” Twilight muttered. "Sarcasm is a big help, thank you."

"Now, I'm not an expert in interdimensional geography," Midnight said, looking down into the rushing waters below. "But I'm going to guess that's the Styx."

"Acheron, actually," Twilight corrected.

“Oh good, I always like to know just which river I’m trapped by. How many demons do you think are actually around here?”

"That's obvious," Twilight said. "We're assuming a sphere twenty kilometers across. If we're assuming the population density is the same throughout the sphere and that we have roughly a fifty meter radius where we would see anything approaching..."

Twilight drew in the dust on a boulder with her hoof.

"Surface area of the sphere is about... one thousand two hundred square kilometers, and we've gone maybe three kilometers and encountered one demon... there could be a population of between four and five thousand demons."

“I think I’d be happier not knowing that,” Midnight admitted.

"Hey!" Twilight called out, one hoof already on the bridge. "I'm going to go across! Get ready in case something goes wrong!"

"If you're lucky, it'll just be slippery and treacherous and threaten to send you screaming to your death on the rocks below," Midnight yelled back.

“Well don’t let that happen!”

"What do you expect me to do about it?" Midnight asked. "No magic, remember?"

"You're almost as smart as I am, so I expect you to figure something out!" Twilight snapped.

“I don’t know if I can, since I’m only almost as smart as you, the mare who thinks walking across that bridge is a good idea.”

Twilight rolled her eyes and started over the bridge, carefully putting one hoof in front of the other as she worked her way to the other side. Her hooves slipped on the slick stone, tripping and almost falling right off into the abyss, her back half hanging precariously over the drop.

"Hold on!" Midnight said, starting towards her. The bridge shook precariously, pebbles falling from the underside of the arch. "The bridge isn't strong enough for both of us!”

“It’s not strong enough for one of us! Do something!”

"You're no help at all," Midnight muttered, spotting dangling vines. She ran over and grabbed them with her teeth, wincing at the taste, something vile shooting into her mouth like popped blisters and pustules as the plant released a burning sap.

A long length of thick foliage tore down from the rock, and Midnight spat it out, then spit a few more times trying to get the taste out of her mouth.

"I could use some help!" Twilight yelled, slipping another inch.

“I know! I’m working on it!” Midnight tied the vines around her barrel, leaving one end anchored on the rock.

"The weight distribution is all wrong!" Twilight yelled, even as her hooves failed to find purchase. "You need to tie the knot differently!"

"Are you criticising my plan to save your life?" Midnight asked, incredulous. She started edging her way along the bridge, feeling it shift under her.

"It's not a plan if you don't actually do any planning!" Twilight snapped. "I studied several books of knots and-" She felt a hoof lose its grip entirely, and started sliding over the edge.

Midnight dove for her, the bridge crumbling under her hooves, grabbing her just as she plunged over the side, the momentum making her slide off, too. The knot around her waist held, the rope slipping to her hips as she swung down towards the cliff wall, almost popping free and even more narrowly avoiding dislocating her hip as they came to a sudden stop, dangling thirty feet down from the top, vine creaking and dripping with vile bile. Rocks cascaded down from the ruined bridge, the whole thing disintegrating until there was no sign it anything had spanned the chasm at all.

"Ow." Midnight winced.

"I was trying to say that a harness over the shoulders would be safer," Twilight said, quietly.

“Thank you for the feedback,” Midnight squeaked.

"And more comfortable," Twilight continued, looking at Midnight's pained expression. Midnight nodded, uncomfortably aware that her hips were the only thing keeping them from falling to their doom.

“Shut up and help me climb back up. We’ll find another bridge. A better one.”

"There has to be another way across,” Twilight said, for the third time. This time it was more to make herself believe it.

Midnight nodded and followed her along the edge of the river-worn rift until they spotted a bridge. As they got closer, Twilight slowed, letting her limping twin catch up.

"That's- that's the same bridge!" Twilight said, in a panic.

"It can't be the same bridge." Midnight rubbed at her face, her lips red and swollen from the stuff the vines had sprayed on her face and into her mouth.

"We've already proven that this place has nonstandard spacetime," Twilight replied, shaking her had. "It's possible, even likely, that the river just flows back in on itself in a circle. The chasm could act like a kind of containment net, fencing off part of Tartarus."

"I wonder..." Midnight muttered. "It's a pretty deep chasm. What if the river eroded the rock all the way to the other side?" She pointed. "I think some of those rocks are actually bobbing with the current. They must go all the way through to the other side!"

"It'd more or less orbit as a torus around the gravitational discontinuity," Twilight muttered, thinking. "But what about the rock inside the torus, cut off from the rest?"

"This whole thing is getting us nowhere," Midnight said. "I've got an idea."

Twilight stopped, taking a deep breath and composing herself. "Is it going to involve doing a great number of things without planning or thinking?"

"Yep." Midnight walked over to the edge of the chasm and peered down. "How far up do you think we are? Thirty or forty meters?"

"Thirty-seven," Twilight said. "I got a very good look when I was hanging over the abyss, thank you."

"I bet if we land in the water right, we wouldn't get hurt."

"No, we'd just be killed," Twilight snorted. "Even ten meters is almost certain to be a fatal fall, and this is three times that."

"Okay, but, consider the following," Midnight said. "We'd be landing in water, and the usual reason that's bad is because water isn't compressible and it's basically the same as hitting the bottom. However, this water probably goes all the way to the other side of the gravitational discontinuity, so the bottom is actually the top of the other side of the river."

"You realize the question as to if it's safe depends entirely on the question of how much water there actually is, and if the river has actually gone through the dimensional boundary?" Twilight frowned. "I can't even begin to calculate the odds."

"It's that or wait here until we starve," Midnight shrugged. "I'd rather take the chance. Cliff divers do forty meter dives all the time. We just have to keep good form."

"Oh great, so we've got..." Numbers danced in Twilight's head for a moment. "Two point eight seconds to learn on the way down."

"Think of it more like, um, the rest of our lives?" Midnight smiled sheepishly.

“We’re not jumping off the cliff,” Twilight said through clenched teeth.

“There you are!” Grogar hissed. Twilight and Midnight looked up. The skeletal goat was perched on the rocks overhead, standing at an impossible angle with no visible purchase for his hooves, as goats are wont to do.

He started skidding down the rocks towards them, pebbles hitting the narrow ledge Twilight and Midnight stood on.

"How did he catch us so quickly?!"

"You know what?" Twilight said. "I’m rapidly reappraising my decision regarding cliffs and jumping, and I’ve come down in favor."

"Just remember," Midnight said. "The best thing to do is go flank down, try and land with your back hooves together. Small profile, less landing shock. Should be..." She hesitated. "I'm sure we'll be fine."

"We'll go at the same time," Twilight said. "On three."

"One," Midnight tensed her legs, looking down.

"Two." Twilight stepped beside her.

"Three!" They jumped at the same time, the water rushing up to meet them and as warm as bathwater for a moment before up became down and left became right and the water was icy cold and--

They popped out of the other side like a cork.

Their momentum carried them a few dozen feet, and then they started plunging back down towards the river below.

"Right! How much do you know about hypersphere geometry? Because I'll be honest, I skipped those classes and went for the 400-level evocation course instead!" Midnight yelled.

"Fat lot of good that's doing you now that neither of us has magic!”

"Please. Like you didn't get a doctor's note to get you out of gym so you could attend the grad student lectures on abjurations and wardings. I bet you're really enjoying all those extra days spent on your flank instead of staying in shape like me!"

"And here I thought Tia and Lulu would be the ones doing the most fighting," Discord muttered, crunching popcorn. “I’m amazed this place isn’t freezing over!”

Twilight and Midnight spun around to look at him.

"Oh, don't mind me," he said. "In fact, I'd be much more concerned about what’s on the other side."

They hit the water hard.

Midnight grabbed Twilight and lunged to the side, pulling her away just as Grogar's cloven hoof swept through the air where her head had been.

"Why is Discord here?!” Twilight yelled.

“Focus! One thing at a time!” Midnight screamed. “Pretend there’s a checklist!”

“Uh, um, item one, don’t get killed by Grogar!”

They dropped back into the water

“Do you need a hand? Talon? Hoof? Tentacle?” Discord offered.

“Item two, don’t trust Discord!”

“Well, that’s just offensive.” He pulled his claw back just before Midnight could grab it.

“Why aren’t we stopping?!”

“We’re going to oscillate between the two sides until friction cancels out our momentum!” Twilight yelled.

“That should have happened already!”

“There might be some kind of anomalous effect from the discontinuity, depending on the structure of the vector trap! I’m not in a position to take precise measurements!”

“Death awaits you!” Grogar croaked, lunging for them, jumping from the rocks.

Twilight and Midnight screamed.

“That’s enough of that,” Discord said, catching Grogar before the skull could snap shut on the ponies, shoving him back into the water and snapping his fingers, freezing over the river with a sheet of ice.

Midnight and Twilight landed in a convenient pile of feathers.

“That should keep him busy,” Discord muttered. “I never did like that one. It’s one thing to be careless and break your toys, its another thing to pull them apart on purpose and play with the pieces.”

“What did you do?” Twilight asked, spitting out goose down.

“I saved your lives,” Discord said. “You could say thank you.”

Midnight and Twilight glared at him.

"It's not like I'm trying to kill you," Discord protested. "I've never killed a single pony. I learned very quickly that if you break all your toys, you stop having any fun."

"You put us in Tartarus!" Midnight yelled.

"Bluh bluh bluh bluh!" Discord folded his arms. "There are some ponies that would love to be in Tartarus. You should thank me."

"I find that hard to believe," Twilight muttered.

"You're only foals, you won't understand how much worse things could be -- you've never even worked retail!"

"That only happens if you don't get a degree," Twilight said.

"In this economy you'll be lucky to get a retail job, even with a doctorate in magical bupkiss. You need a thousand years of management experience if you want anything that isn't entry-level." Discord snapped his talons and a Hayburger Princess uniform appeared on Twilight.

"Let us out of here!" Midnight demanded. "We don't deserve to be in Tartarus!"

"I didn't deserve to be turned to stone and I didn't even get to complain about it," Discord huffed.

Twilight and Midnight looked at each other, sharing a thought.

"I challenge you to a contest!" Twilight said. "If I win, we go free!"

"A contest?" Discord chuckled. "You mean a fiddle of gold against your soul that says I'm better than you?"

"I..." Twilight tilted her head. "...maybe? But not a violin. I don't play."

"Chess?" Midnight suggested.

Discord gagged. "If I die of boredom we'll have to call it a draw. How about boxing? Tell you what - we’ll play chess between rounds and play to best of three checkmates or three knockouts.” Twilight slipped and fell as boxing gloves appeared on her hooves, though thankfully the one on her horn prevented a concussion.

“I’d prefer to avoid brain damage,” Twilight put in, from the ground.

“Fine, no boxing,” Discord sighed. The gloves vanished. “I suppose we’ll have to do something easier, then. I have other ponies to save from their lives of boredom, you know! I can’t spend all day giving you special attention or they’ll be jealous.”

“Tic-tac-toe,” Twilight said.

“Are you crazy?” Midnight hissed. “That’s a solved game! The only way you’d win is if he was an idiot!”

“It doesn’t matter what we pick, he’ll cheat anyway!” Twilight countered.

“She’s not wrong,” Discord admitted. “Cheating is half the game!”

“At least pick something we have a chance at!” Midnight yelled.

“Oh don’t be mad at her,” Discord said. “It’s better than Rock, Paper, Scissors. Ponies only ever seem to throw rock. Dreadfully boring how it always ends in ties.”

“Oubliettes and Ogres!”

“I misplaced my twenty-sided dice,” Discord snorted. “I’ll pick for you, since you’re being dull -- and don’t complain, because I don’t have to humor you with this at all. I’m only doing it because you two cause enough chaos to be interesting.”

He snapped his talons, and a felt table appeared between him and the twins, a deck of cards popping into existence a few moments after he started shuffling empty air, showing up mid-riffle. A half-dozen chips appeared on the table in front of each of them.

“The rules are simple. Five-card draw, and all you have to do is run me out of chips before you go bust.” Discord grinned. “How hard can it be?”

“We can do this,” Twilight whispered. “I know how to count cards.”

“He’s going to cheat, remember?” Midnight cautioned.

“We’ll just cut the deck after he shuffles,” Twilight said. “That’s fine, isn’t it?”

“Oh of course,” Discord said, putting the deck on the table. “Go ahead.”

Twilight smugly cut the deck, and Discord started dealing. Before they even looked at their cards, two of Twilight’s chips and one of Midnight’s rolled on their own to the center of the table.

“Wait, I didn’t make a bet yet!” Midnight yelled.

“Casino rules,” Discord said, mildly. “Don’t tell me you don’t even know about blinds? I’d give you a rulebook but then I’d have to penalize you for delay of game.”

“Is he right?” Midnight whispered.

“Unfortunately,” Twilight grumbled. “I read a book on card games before Orange’s birthday party.”

“So what’s the game?” Midnight asked. “And I don’t mean poker. What’s this all about?”

“I’m in a grand mood. I’m free! All-powerful! And I heard from a little bird that there’s nothing to worry about. When you’ve been blessed with such a surfeit of riches you can afford to be generous, non?” He smiled and dealt the cards.

Midnight looked at what she had and frowned.

“Did you shuffle right?”

“I shuffled with both left and right,” Discord corrected. “I’m not enough of a card shark to manage it one-handed yet.”

Twilight looked around.

“What?” Discord frowned.

“I was looking for a shark fin, or a joke about a bigger boat…”

“Good heavens, am I that predictable?” Discord sighed. “Get rid of the shark, we’re not using it!”

A half-dozen Discords, one of them in a shark costume, stepped out from behind the rocks and grumbled, wandering off.
“That’s going to get me in trouble with the union,” he sighed.

“I fold,” Midnight said, tossing her cards down.

“You’re a blind, don’t fold!” Twilight hissed. “You already have money in the pot, stupid!”

“It was a crap hand and he’s probably cheating anyway.”

“I’m not, and I am extremely offended you’d say that,” Discord said. “These are perfectly normal cards.”

Midnight’s discarded cards got up and walked around the table.

“Almost perfectly normal.”

Twilight grumbled when her own cards proved just as bad as Midnight’s, and Discord swept up the pot.

A few hands later, Twilight had learned two things. First, that Discord had absolutely no reliable tells. Second, she was terrible at poker.

Midnight still had five chips. She had one. Twilight watched it roll into the pot on its own.

“You know, this is getting rather dull,” Discord yawned. “I suppose I can’t leave you two here on your own or you’d end up breaking it trying to get out, and there are a few people, things, peoples-shaped things, and thing-shaped people that would be unhappy with me if they managed to get out.”

“You’re going to let us go?” Twilight’s ears perked up.

“I was hoping you two would cheat or some up with some kind of clever strategy,” Discord said, disappointed.

“Cheating is wrong,” Twilight muttered.

“I know you’ve done that friendship lesson already but I think even Sunbutt would tell you to make an exception when your life’s on the line.” Discord shrugged mildly. “She cheats all the time. Why, she even decided not to tell your duplicate where she comes from, just because it made it easier for her to keep Sunset Shimmer under hoof.”

“What?” Midnight dropped her cards.

“Oh, it’s true,” Discord said, grinning cruelly. “She knows exactly where you belong. So do I, of course, but we’ve only known each other for a few hours. She’s had years to tell you, and she keeps avoiding it.”

“Sunset already found out,” Midnight protested. “There was a spell and-”

“Spell nothing,” Discord said. “It’s much more tragic than that.” He shuffled the cards back together and ripple shuffled, the exposed cards showing, just for a moment, something just like Midnight’s occasional nightmares. A world with strange, two-legged creatures.

“Tell me,” Midnight said, quietly.

“Why? What’s in it for me?” Discord grinned.

“So you don’t know,” Midnight huffed, sitting down. “You’re just reading my mind or something and pretending you know!”

“If Princess Celestia knew where she came from, she’d send her back,” Twilight said.

“Would she?” Discord asked. “She’s ruthless in her own way. I’m sure she could justify it a dozen different ways. She’s probably spent hours making sure she had the perfect argument to use once you find out you’re not even a pony.”

“What?” Twilight gasped, looking at Midnight suspiciously.

“He’s lying!” Midnight yelled.

“I’ll make you a better offer than Celestia ever would,” Discord said. “I’ll wager the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. Of course you’ll need to put something on the line to make it worth my time.”

“I’ve still got five chips.” Midnight shoved them into the middle of the table.

“Unfortunately, it looks like your better half doesn’t have anything to match your bet.” Discord looked at Twilight and smirked. “Unless she can think of something? Maybe a little… favor?”

Twilight blushed. “I’m not doing that!”

“Ew!” Discord recoiled. “You’re as bad as Cadance! Don’t you know girls have cooties? Not that kind of favor! I swear, you mares these days showing your ankles and cutie marks. I just mean some small, simple task.”

“What, like not using the Elements of Harmony against you?”

“You practically read my mind,” Discord said, grinning more widely than his face allowed, the edges stretching into the open air.

“No way,” Twilight said.

“If I was really worried about you using them, I’d just leave you here,” Discord motioned to the skeleton trapped in the ice. “I just like hedging my bets.”

“Twilight, come on,” Midnight hissed. “If he’s telling the truth…”

“If he’s telling the truth, you might find a way to be the only know-it-all in Canterlot,” Discord finished.

“But- Celestia said our talent was doing magic together! What if he’s just trying to separate us so we can’t help Nightmare Moon and your mom?”

Discord pulled a pencil from behind his ear and started writing on his palm. “...separate them… so they can’t help each other…” He tucked the pencil away and ripped off his palm, which thankfully seemed to be made of paper (not college-ruled, to Twilight’s horror), putting the note in a pocket. “That’s an excellent idea to keep for later.”

“Stop giving the evil chaos spirit ideas!” Midnight groaned.

“I’m not evil,” Discord scoffed. “Next you’ll say I’m not handsome!”

“You put us in Pony Hell.”

“That says more about you than about me.” Discord shuffled the deck. “So how about it? One last hand, double or nothing?”

“Yes!” Midnight said, instantly.

“N-nnnf.” Twilight growled. “Fine.”

Discord passed the deck over to Midnight. “Here. You shuffle. I do want this to be fair, after all. If the cards are in your hooves, how much fairer could it be?”

“Do you know how hard it is shuffling without magic?” Twilight complained.

“It’s no problem. I’m good with my hooves anyway,” Midnight said. “Besides, this is important.”

“Yes, that’s why I should be doing it,” Twilight grumbled.

“What, you don’t even trust me to shuffle cards?”

“Well apparently you’re not even a pony.”

Discord smirked.

Midnight glared at her and started shuffling. She’d never had to do it with her hooves before, the whole thing akin, to those with hands, of having to do everything with your good arm tied behind your back.

She dropped the deck, slapping Twilight’s hoof away when she tried to help her gather it back up.

And that was when Midnight saw three aces, upturned among the mess. She tried to look casual as she flipped cards over and put the deck back together, taking care to put those aces at the bottom.

“So, dealer, what’s the game?” Discord asked, apparently none the wiser as Midnight fake-shuffled a few more times.

“Five-card stud,” Twilight suggested. “It’s fast and I just want this over with.”

“Well, I can’t complain. I’m already a stud, after all.”

Midnight rolled her eyes and started dealing, the aces at the bottom of the deck making it seem heavier, somehow. She tried to seem casual as she dealt the cards out, her natural clumsiness with her hooves making it, she hoped, invisible when she pulled from the bottom for her own hand.

She looked up, and Discord was staring intently at his cards, deep in thought. He didn’t seem to have noticed anything amiss.

“Well, since it’s five-card stud, the most boring of all variants of poker, it’s time for a show of hands,” Discord sighed. “I’ve got one here-” he showed his left talon. “One here-” right talon-” “A few in this bag-”

“Ew…” Midnight stuck her tongue out at the duffel bag full of disembodied paws. They waved.

“And in this hand, I have a pair of knaves.” Discord showed his cards.

“That beats my king high,” Twilight sighed, tossing her hand down.

“If you wanted a more exciting hand, you should have suggested something that actually required some kind of skill,” Midnight muttered. She glanced at her hand, making sure the three aces were still safely there.

“Well, that’s not true. There’s counting cards, and bluffing-”

“None of which applies with a new deck and no betting.”

“I just wanted to get it over with!” Twilight snapped.

“You’re just lucky I won.” Midnight smiled and spread her cards on the table.

Instead of the aces she expected, the cards were blank.

“What?” Midnight gasped in surprise.

“You know, it takes a lot of gall to try to cheat a god,” Discord said. “I’m proud of you. There aren’t nearly enough ponies with the cajones to try and deal from the bottom of the deck right in front of me.”

Midnight’s cheeks burned red.

“Unfortunately, that renders our little wager null and void,” Discord sighed. “I suppose that means you’ll have to keep begging Tia for the truth. It might be a while before she gets back from her vacation to the photosphere, so I wouldn’t wait up if I was you.”

“Wait, I didn’t cheat!” Twilight yelled. “What about-”

“Sorry, it’s double or nothing. Or in your case, double and nothing.” Discord shrugged. “I’m helpless before the rules. Oh well. Ta ta!”

He vanished in a flash of light, along with the table, chips, and most of the cards, except the five blank ones that had been Midnight’s hand, the cards fluttering down to the ground and vanishing in sparkles one by one as they settled.

And they were left alone in Tartarus.

“I can’t believe you!” Twilight yelled. “You cheated?!”

“I needed to win!” Midnight snapped. “What if Celestia really is keeping something from me?!”

“She keeps things from everypony, it would just mean you aren’t as special as you think!” Twilight retorted. “What does it matter?!”

“You just-” Midnight groaned. “You couldn’t understand.”

“Oh sure. I couldn’t understand. Mom always said that when a pony tells you that, it means they just don’t know how to explain it without sounding stupid, because they mean they don’t understand.” Twilight turned away, shaking her head. “I understand perfectly fine. You care more about yourself than you do about Equestria.”

“No I don’t!”

“Then how come you were willing to make that bet in the first place?”

“I just-- I--”

Midnight looked down, falling silent. She opened her mouth, trying to find the right words for an apology.

The ice cracked, and a skeletal hoof pushed out of the thawing river.

“Oh buck,” Midnight hissed.

“Wow, I nearly forgot!” Discord said, popping back in. He was wearing sunglasses and a floral shirt. “I went on my vacation and it just slipped my mind about sending you home.”

The ice cracked more, Grogar slowly freeing himself.

“Actually, give me a minute. I forgot my drink. You wouldn’t believe what they charge for a Baja Blast these days. Do I look like I’m made of bits? Don’t go anywhere.”

He vanished in a flash of light.

“Don’t look at me,” Twilight growled, glaring at Midnight. “He’s the one you apparently trust more than Celestia. Our teacher. Who rules Equestria.”

“I’m sorry, okay?” Midnight muttered. “I was wrong.”

“At least you can admit that,” Twilight sighed. “When Grogar gets out of the ice, you go left, I’ll go right, and he can only chase one of us at a time.”

“That’s a terrible plan.”

“Not as bad a plan as cheating. Trust me, it never works out.”

Grogar pulled his front half free.

“Back!” Discord said, reappearing with half a coconut in one talon, sipping from a crazy straw that wound its way down and around a flock of tiny umbrellas decorating the drink. “You two should really hit up Trotuga sometime. Wonderful place.”

“Sounds good!” Midnight said. “Let’s go now!”

“I don’t think a cheater deserves a reward. Besides, you’d need to be a little older to really appreciate it.”

Grogar roared, one of his back legs popping out of joint as he freed himself, hop-limping towards them.

“What was I going to do…” Discord muttered. “There was something…” he took another sip of his drink as the undead horror charged at them.

Twilight screamed. Midnight screamed. Grogar screamed.

“Oh right! I was going to send you brats home.”

Discord snapped his talons and they vanished in a burst of light.

Chapter 27

Celestia sat in court, alone aside from her guards. The day was as quiet as always, the sun behind a thick layer of clouds to shield the ponies of Equestria from its harsh rays, leaving things pleasantly cool.

The doors opened, and she perked up, her pale pink mane whipping back like a wind had caught it, responding to her excitement before she managed to calm herself, the flow of magic through it tempering back down as she composed herself.

“Greetings, my little pony,” she said. “How can I help you?”

The pony in question looked around. He was an earth pony, and the farmer looked out of place amidst the dark grey marble and silver of the palace, but she was thankful to see anypony at this hour.

“Greetings, yer highness,” the earth pony said. “Uh, I know this is a mite irregular, but your sister’s schedule is filled up and… I was hopin I could at least talk to somepony before I had to go back to the fields.”

“Of course,” Celestia said, her smile straining at the mention of her sister’s packed schedule. It was always packed. She never had to worry about being alone for hours on end, about ponies ignoring her. “I’m always happy to help.”

“Thank you,” he said, looking grateful. “Now, we’re pretty tough and used to workin’ the fields so we can handle not havin’ cloud cover like you have here in Canterlot, but we don’t have near enough rain. Is there anythin’ you can do?”

“I’m guessing you already wrote to the House of Cloudsdale?” Celestia asked.

“They said since we didn’t have any real weather team, we didn’t have the right to ask them.”

“I see,” Celestia said. “I’ll write you a letter for special dispensation for now, but they’re right that you’ll need a local weather team. I’ll see what I can do. There are quite a few farms in the east that are suffering from the same problems -- the griffons didn’t maintain the land when they were in control, and it’s suffered badly from it.”

“Trust me, I know,” the farmer said. “It’s hard land to work. Mostly scrubland, really, but somepony’s got to do it, and plantin’ the right crops will help heal the soil.”

Celestia nodded and listened to him talk about farming, half paying attention but responding to him and keeping him talking while she wrote a few letters, sealing them with a ribbon and the seal of the Equestrian throne, a moon eclipsing a sun.

“Here,” she said, handing him the letters. “These should help. You’ll have the weather you need, and so will the farms around you.”

“Thank you, yer highness,” he said, bowing.

Celestia smiled and watched him leave. Once he was gone, she was alone again. She glanced at the clock. It was still hours until dusk.

She sighed and sat back in the throne, made for a pony far larger than she was.

Maybe it was time to go out and do something to help them if they weren't going to come to her.

Celestia panted with exhaustion, sweat dripping from her body and matting her coat as she stumbled into town. It was the middle of the day, and most of the ponies in town were staying out of the heat and glare of the sun in the cool darkness of their homes. The town stood quiet and dead, dust blowing in the streets and heat haze turning the air into a wavy blur.

The pale princess trotted to the well in the center of the village, drawing up a bucket and pouring it over her head, cooling herself and washing some of the sweat away, the ice-cold water helping to revive her. She shook out her mane and looked around. Nopony had come out to look or greet her. Celestia hadn't been quiet, but she'd been out here for hours now, and nopony had interrupted her or offered her any aid.

"The blockage in the river is gone," she said, exhausted, her voice echoing through the empty streets. "The famine will be over soon. Your fields are already starting to grow again." She'd spent those hours using her earth pony magic to force the trees to grow new leaves to replace the ones that had wilted in the harsh sunlight.

A door creaked open behind her. Celestia turned, smiling.

"P-please go," a mare's voice said, from behind the door, the pony invisible in the shadows. "I'm sorry. We can't offer you a feast or tribute. We have nothing."

"The only thing I want is-" Celestia started. The door slammed shut before she could finish. "-to do my duty to you all..." she finished, trailing off in silence. She stood there for a few moments longer, her head bowed, before leaving, vanishing in a flare of light and swirling dust.

“It’s always a beautiful sight,” Luna said, as the weather teams peeled back the clouds in preparation for sunset.

Something about that tickled at the edge of Celestia’s consciousness. There was something important about Sunset...

“Are you feeling alright, Sister?” Luna asked, looking down at her, her aurora-colored mane swirling as gently as the nightly breezes that kept the sky clear.

“Just... tired, Sister,” Celestia lied.

“Oh yes, I heard you had a caller at court today,” Luna said, smiling serenely. “I’m glad. Sometimes it seems like ponies don’t enjoy the daytime as much as they should.”

“How can I blame them?” Celestia said, sullenly. “All of them just sleep through it because there’s nothing to see. Even if they weren’t blinded by the light, there’s nothing except the blank blue sky. I wish it was as beautiful as your night.”

“It is beautiful,” Luna assured her. “And if it wasn’t for the sun, plants wouldn’t grow. Ponies need the sun.”

“Maybe, but they aren’t inspired by it,” Celestia sighed. Luna nuzzled her, and she froze up for a moment.

“Even if they don’t appreciate you, I do,” Luna assured her.

Celestia gave her a weak smile. “Thank you. But it’s time, isn’t it? We have a ball to get to.”

Luna nodded, and their horns lit up, the sky fading from red to black. Below them, Canterlot came to life, the lights of the city mirroring the lights in the sky above.

"Sometimes I feel like you don't take me seriously," Celestia said. "I need your help."

Luna sighed without breaking the placid smile on her face, looking out over the ball from where she and Celestia were perched on a high balcony. "Celestia, you're jumping at shadows. We're at peace."

"It isn't peace I'm worried about," Celestia said, more quietly. "The nobility shuns me, Luna. There are barely enough ponies coming to Day Court to justify even opening the doors."

"Well you can't blame them, Tia," Luna said. "Most of them have to sleep during the day! Don't you see them anyway when you go out on your little adventures?"

"Yes, but..." Celestia hesitated. "Most ponies don't want to admit they need help. The land isn't tamed and they need to believe they're doing it all themselves."

"You could change that," Luna suggested, turning away from the ball to give Celestia her full attention. "You've been helping our little ponies turn this land into a beautiful, fertile home. You should remind them that you've been lending a hoof."

"I suppose, Sister," Celestia considered. "But there are some ponies that think I'm not worthy to sit on the throne. I've heard rumors they want to petition you to have my authority reduced."

"They can make as many petitions as they want, Celestia, but it will never change anything between us," Luna assured her, leaning down to nuzzle her little sister.

"What if we tried a combined court?" Celestia asked. "Then they would see us rule side-by-side, as equals."

"Let's try my idea first," Luna said. "If ponies knew how much you were helping them, you'd have a swell of support from below. Besides, you deserve to have total authority over the day."

"I suppose," Celestia sighed.

"Come," Luna said, sounding excited. "I think I see just the thing to brighten your mood -- chocolate cake!"

“It’s not fair,” Celestia huffed, pacing around her quarters. “Why do they all love her? The sun is just as beautiful as the moon.”

“Is it? They wouldn’t know, since they can’t look at it without going blind,” somepony asked.

“Who’s there?!” Celestia demanded, spinning around, looking for the intruder.

“Over here,” the voice said. She followed it, and couldn’t figure out where it was coming from until she looked in the mirror. And there, she saw herself, but it was all wrong. She was tall, maybe even taller than her sister, with a mane of flowing, glowing fire.

“What- who are you?!” Celestia demanded, though part of her instinctively knew she was looking at herself, in the same way being in a dream could just make you know things. It didn’t matter that it didn’t really look like her. She just knew what it was.

“I’m what you could be,” the apparition said, showing fangs in her mouth, teeth as black as glittering coal. “If you weren’t under your sister’s hoof.”

“My sister loves me,” Celestia snarled.

“She does,” the figure agreed, nodding and blinking eyes that were glowing from within, the pupils like hourglasses, like a goat’s eyes. “But she still walks all over you, and you let her. The ponies of Equestria don’t even care about you, the sister that waves the burning sun across the sky, the sister that asked for peace and friendship when they wanted war with Griffonstone.”

“T-the war was wrong,” Celestia whispered.

“Perhaps it was. But that doesn’t matter, does it? What matters is that ponies saw how weak you are. How pathetic you are!” Her double snarled. “Look at you! You can’t even stand up to yourself!”

“This is just how the world is,” Celestia said, turning away. “There’s nothing I can do to change it.”

“No. But you can change yourself.”

“What are you--” Celestia turned, but the only image in the mirror was hers. Not the huge, powerful pony she could be, but the small, meek one she was. Her eyes were wet, the tracks of tears down her cheeks plainly visible in the candlelight.

Another night passed, with Celestia sleeping while Equestria was awake, not even getting out of bed until a servant came to wake her up, reminding her that it was time for dawn. By the time she got to the balcony, the sun was already rising.

“Ah, Sister,” Luna said, a little sheepishly. “I heard you weren’t feeling well, and I was just taking care of things for you.” Grey clouds started across the sky like a tide, covering up the unsightly blue sky.

“It’s fine,” Celestia said, quietly. “I’m sorry I was late.”

“We’re all allowed to have off days,” Luna said, so wise and understanding and perfect. Celestia felt her heart thud in her chest, a combination of envy and rage almost overtaking her, leaving her dazed and shivering. She missed what Luna said next, everything a blur until she looked up and saw her sister’s worried gaze.

“Are you sick?” Luna asked. “I’ll get a doctor.”

“No, I’m... I’m fine,” Celestia said. “I just didn’t sleep well.”

“I’m sorry, sister,” Luna apologized. “I’ll try to find more time to watch over your dreams. I’ve been neglecting you, and you only take rest when our subjects are awake and the matters of state-”

“Luna, it’s nothing!” Celestia snapped, with anger in her tone that surprised even her. Luna jerked her head back. “I’m sorry,” Celestia said, looking away. “I just--”

“Whatever’s bothering you, you can always talk to me about it,” Luna said. “If you want. My door is always open for you.”

Celestia nodded, and Luna hugged her before she left. Celestia looked down at the city. There were still a few lights on at this early hour, but they were being extinguished one by one as ponies retired to sleep. In the grey light of day, the city was like a tomb, with no sign of life like the rivers of light and sound that streets became at night.

She turned away from the dead-looking city and stalked the quiet halls to the throne room.

“Your highness, it’s good to see you,” the griffon said. Celestia nodded slowly.

“I don’t think we’ve met,” she said.

“Few griffons are willing or allowed to travel to Canterlot,” the griffon explained. “And even those who can, don’t want to deal with your sister, the Warmonger.”

“Please don’t insult her,” Celestia said, sighing.

“You called her the same thing when she raised companies of ponies to conquer Griffonstone in the name of peace.” He snorted and spat at that. “She didn’t even want to try negotiation.”

“Is there something you wanted?” Celestia asked, frowning.

“I’ve been told that you have few friends these days,” the griffon said. “The griffons would be far more willing to listen to you, the pony who advocated for peace and understanding, than the one who killed so many of our friends and families.”

“I see,” Celestia considered. “I am of course happy to assist with anything I can. I always have been, and now that you’re citizens of Equestria it’s my sworn duty.”

“Of course,” the griffon said. “And in return, we’d want to help you, with whatever you desire.”

Celestia tossed and turned, half awake and half asleep.

In her dreams, she saw Discord, her oldest friend.

Images, as disjointed and ill-fitting as Discord's anatomy, swept past her.

From time to time, Celestia had suffered through dreams like this, visions of terror and danger that she could do nothing to change, prophetic visions that never revealed the solution to a problem. They'd always come true.

This time, she saw Discord released, sitting on the throne. And she knew, for a fact, the way one sometimes just knows something in a dream, that he would never be imprisoned again.

She saw the Elements of Harmony being turned on one of their own.

From her mirror, her reflection watched her with yellowed, slitted eyes.

"Isn't that interesting..." It whispered, before vanishing in a flash of light.

Celestia groaned as she got up. She felt like she hadn’t slept at all, but it was time for dawn. This time, she managed to stumble out to the balcony before Luna could take care of things for herself.

“Good evening,” Luna said, jokingly. “Should I assume you’re feeling better after last night?”

“I don’t even remember what I did,” Celestia mumbled, her head pounding. The sunrise was nothing special, barely any color or art to it. It hardly seemed worth it, these days. Ponies didn’t really watch it. She was playing to an audience of one.

Two, perhaps. Luna always watched.

“I would guess it involved quite a bit of drinking,” Luna said, with an edge of judgement to her tone. The way she said it implied that she’d never get caught drunk, with a massive hangover. Implying that Celestia was inferior. Unrefined. Improper.

Celestia considered telling Luna about her dream, but the headache spiked, and her feelings of anger were washed away for a moment with a painful throb. By the time she found something to relieve the pain, she'd decided to keep it to herself.

“What?!” Celestia yelled, slamming her hoof on the table in alarm. Her glass toppled, spilling cider across the tablecloth, forks and spoons clattering to the floor.

“It’s a simple request, sister,” Luna said. “The ponies just asked for a holiday where the sun doesn’t rise above the horizon for a full day.”

“But-” Celestia shook with anger. “Even if it caused no harm, the other nations won’t understand! They’ll accuse us of playing with the heavenly clockwork like foals, and they’ll be right!”

“I’m not concerned with what they think,” Luna said. “I’ll inform them, of course, but the more I think about it, the more I like the idea. They’ll be reminded about who controls the sky, and they’ll have to explain to their own people that we can do things that they cannot countermand. Besides, with the sun down, it’ll give us both a chance to sleep in for a day.”

“That’s not the point,” Celestia said. “The cycle of sun and moon is a symbol of stability. It’s about the Harmony that we restored after defeating Discord!”

A jolt of pain ran down her horn, and she winced. Luna used the opportunity to pounce on the hesitation, standing up to her full, imposing height and looming over her smaller sister.

“I think you’re just caught up in your own feelings, sister,” Luna said, disappointed. “This is about the good of Equestria, not about feeding your ego. I know you haven’t been feeling well, but part of being a Princess is about sacrifice and doing what’s good for our little ponies, not just what’s good for you.”

“I know that,” Celestia mumbled.

“Good. We’ll have the celebration on the winter solstice. That gives us a few months to prepare for the event, and for you to recover your composure.”

“Is she really doing what’s right?” Celestia asked, pacing in her quarters. “This stupid… Winter Moon Celebration… is it about showing Equestria’s power, or is it just about her?”

“It’s an excuse,” said the voice in her mirror. Celestia didn’t look at it, just pacing, the form reflected in the silvered surface huge and regal in all the ways she was small. “Luna already controls everything. You’re just the spare.”

“She didn’t even consult me,” Celestia continued, only half listening. “She decided on her own and just… informed me. Like I’m a servant!”

“The servants are treated with more respect,” the voice retorted. “They do something to contribute. You’re more like the furniture. Something pretty to look at.”

There was a knock on the door. Celestia started, her wings flaring in surprise.

“Sister? Are you awake?” Asked Luna, her voice gentle and light

“Y-yes, but--” Celestia looked in the mirror. The ominous form was still there, smirking, obviously with no intent to leave.

Luna opened the door, and Celestia froze. The mirror was visible from the doorway. There was no way her sister would miss it.

“I just wanted to see you,” Luna said. She stepped in, glancing at the mirror. Celestia waited for her to react, but the larger alicorn just continued, as if she didn’t see anything at all.

“Of course not,” the other voice said. “I’m just in your head. She can’t hear me.”

“I’m worried about you,” Luna continued. “You barely leave your room now, much less the castle. I was at least hoping you’d come to the annual Grand Victory Gala. It felt hollow celebrating the end of the war without you there at my side.”

“Did anypony even notice but you?” Celestia asked, with more venom than she intended.

“Of course they did. They were too polite to say anything, so I had to make excuses for you.”

“They likely enjoyed the excuses more than my company,” Celestia grumbled.

“Sister, they’re our subjects,” Luna said, frowning and stepping closer. “You need to make more of an effort to reach out to them.”

“To-” Celestia hissed, almost spitting. “You want me to reach out to them when they shun me?! Even the griffons are more polite to me than your little ponies!”

“‘Your’?” Luna questioned. “You mean ‘our’. You’re just as much their ruler as I am.”

“Tell that to them!” Celestia motioned to the window, the lights of the city just barely visible through her gossamer curtains. She didn’t need the thick light-blocking curtains that had become common in the city, since she slept at night, unlike most Equestrians.

“You’re acting like a foal,” Luna said, disappointed. “You can’t expect them to change unless you change. I know that better than most.” She stepped over to the mirror. Celestia froze as Luna faced the spectre within, apparently invisible to her.

“Just leave,” Celestia snapped. “You have more important things to do, like your Victory Gala!”

“If that’s what you wish,” Luna said, still looking into the mirror. “You should be careful, though, sister. Stare too long into the sun and even you will go blind.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Celestia asked, snorting with anger.

Luna turned and trotted to the door, not looking at her. “It would be pointless to explain it to you now. You’ll understand soon enough, I think.”

Her sister left, and Celestia followed her to the door, slamming it closed behind her. She spun on the mirror, expecting to confront the sinister shape within, but all she saw was her own reflection, her eyes red and watery with unshed tears.

"Out!" Celestia screamed, the petitioner running from her fury, the edge of her mane roiling like flames. "Luna, I demand to know what this is about!"

She threw a scroll at her sister, Luna picking it out of the air without even looking at it.

"Court is, apparently, canceled for tonight," Luna said, motioning to the ponies around her. The nobility started moving at a slow, stately pace.

"OUT!" Celestia bellowed, the room heating like an oven, the glass in the windows cracking from the volume of her voice.

The nobility, now sufficiently motivated, fled the room in a stampede. Celestia seethed, waiting for Luna to respond to her demand.

"It was a simple, harmless request," Luna replied, sounding amused. "One of the nobles petitioned the court to reduce the length of the day by an hour to help cool the land in this time of drought. It should only be a few months until the pegasai can produce enough rain to turn things around."

"And you agreed without even consulting me!" Celestia yelled, stomping her hoof hard enough to crack the tile floor.

"I tried," Luna said. "For some reason, you decided to lock yourself in your chambers for a week instead of holding court."

"What's the point when I am the only one who attends?!" Celestia demanded. "They'd all rather bend knee to you and pretend I don't exist! I've slaved to make this land bountiful for generations!"

"What is wrong with you, Celestia," Luna asked, softly, with an odd amusement in her voice. "You weren't like this before. You used to put your duty ahead of your own desires."

"I don't even have a duty anymore!" Celestia screamed, tears running down her cheeks. "You took it all away from me!"

"Celestia--"

"I know what this is really about!" Celestia interrupted, stepping back, suddenly wary and paranoid. "You want to be the only ruler of Equestria! You wanted me out of power!"

"Is that what I wanted?" Luna asked, barely holding back a giggle.

"I won't become a new piece for your statue garden," Celestia growled, vanishing in a flare of teleportation.

Luna broke down with laughter, unable to contain herself.

"Not another step!" Celestia warned.

Luna stopped and looked up at her sister, the smaller white alicorn twitching and paranoid, looking at the shadowed corners as if they might be full of assassins and spies.

"Tia, you're not looking well," Luna noted. "Perhaps you'd like a glass of warm milk and a slice of cake?"

"Did you really expect me to sit idly by while they all basked in your precious night?!"

"So this is what it sounds like from this side," Luna muttered. "No wonder she didn't take me seriously. She sounds like a pouting foal."

"There can only be one Princess in Equestria! And that Princess... will be me!" Celestia stomped, cracking the dark obsidian under her hooves, flames erupting around the throne room, the light and heat becoming stifling.

Celestia's form was consumed in a ball of light, her small form twisting and expanding. Laughter rolled from within, mad and biting.

When the light faded, Celestia stood as tall as Luna, with a mane of solar flame and a sneer that hadn't ever been there before.

"It's really not a good look for you, Celestia."

"Celestia? No, that name won't work anymore. I don't need you anymore, Luna. I can do anything I want, and all I have to do is get rid of anypony who stands in my way!"

"So what should I call you? Hot Flanks?" Luna asked, unconcerned.

"I think from now on you can call me... Daybreaker!" The stars vanished as the sky brightened, the sun rising to its apex, banishing the beautiful night, burning hot and red like a furnace threatening to turn Equestria into ashes.

"Cute," Luna snorted, before firing a concussive blast at her sister, knocking her through the stained glass window behind her.

Daybreaker dodged and weaved, trying to avoid Princess Luna's attacks. How had it come to this? She wasn't supposed to be running! She should have been winning, filled with power and rage and fire!

A beam clipped her wing, nearly taking her out of the air. Blackened feathers tore free as she forced her larger body through a tight maneuver, using the castle's bulk to avoid another blast.

"This is insane!" She hissed. "I'm powerful, I'm better than her! How can I be losing?!"

Daybreaker banked, making a tight turn and spinning. It was a good trick, the barrel roll letting her avoid another barrage of shots and bringing her around to face her sister.

"Here comes the sun!" She cried out, letting loose with a barrage of flames, hitting... nothing. Luna wasn't even there.

"You're so predictable," Luna sighed, from behind her.

Daybreaker hadn't seen the flash of the teleportation. A burst of magic sent her spiraling down, smashing through the skylight of the front hall and crashing into the mosaic floor, shattering what had once been a detailed diagram of the night sky.

"How could this happen?" Daybreaker groaned. She pulled herself across the ground, crawling across the floor until she reached the base of--

It should have been the base of the stand holding the Elements of Harmony, but it was empty. No stand, no Elements. The sun shone through the broken roof like a spotlight giving center stage to the empty stand.

"Don't stop now! Things are just getting good!" A pony stepped out of the shadows. "You were just about to really show your sister who's boss around here!"

Daybreaker looked at the strange stallion, frowning.

"Well, you weren't doing as well as I expected," the bearded pony admitted. "But maybe you'll have a strong second round. I've got a dozen bits riding on you, so at least try to beat the spread."

"Who are you?" Daybreaker demanded, getting to her hooves.

"Just a concerned... well, I don't want to say friend." He smiled a crooked smile.

"I asked you a question!" Daybreaker demanded. She tried to grab him with her magic, and he slipped free like a greased eel.

"Ooh! Please, we're not intimate enough to probe each other with spells. You have to buy me flowers first!"

Daybreaker snarled and threw a burst of flame, her patience dried up like a raisin in the sun.

The stallion vanished in a flash of light just before the flame hit, the fire hitting nothing at all.

"That was--" Daybreaker gasped, recognizing the magic instantly.

Daybreaker's expression fell, and she was surrounded by flame for a moment as her form collapsed down into Celestia's smaller shape.

"I've made a terrible mistake," she whispered.

“Luna, this is all a dream!” Celestia panted, trembling with fear and exhaustion. “I remember everything now. It has to be Discord. He’s--”

“I know,” Luna said, her voice low and dangerous. “I am the Mistress of the Dreaming. I’ve known since he threw us into this absurd world.”

“Then-- then why haven’t you tried to tell me?” Celestia demanded.

Luna turned around, her eyes glowing with cyan light, her pupils slitted like a dragon’s and looking down with unrestrained disdain at her sister. Her coat darkened, from navy blue to black, as she stepped forwards.

“You wouldn’t have listened. Until you worked it out for yourself, the dream would have carried you along in its swell.” She sighed, looking vulnerable for a moment. “And I suppose I was having a sappy dream, too.”

Celestia watched, taking a step back in fear as Nightmare Moon moved, the larger pony stepping away from her to look outside.

“It’s a simple trick,” Nightmare Moon continued. “He just swapped the parts we played in real life. And he had to bend the world to the breaking point to make it work.” She pointed. “Look at that city! Outdoor lighting like that didn’t exist a thousand years ago. Even this castle wasn’t here. He doesn’t care about the logic of it.”

“What did he want from all this?” Celestia asked, quietly.

“Simple enough. He wanted to drive you mad.” Nightmare Moon shrugged. “He assumed since this path drove me to strike you down, it would do the same in reverse.”

“But I didn’t fall for it! I’m free!”

“He also wanted to see what I would do when this was all taken away from me,” Nightmare Moon continued. “Taken from a world where I’m wanted, and thrown back into the reality you made, where they shun me.”

“But--”

“I’m not done talking,” Nightmare Moon hissed. “The reason I knew this was false is because I’ve explored all these possibilities, for a thousand years. Compared to what I was able to create, this is bad comedy.”

“Is this what you wanted?” Celestia asked, not backing down as her sister advanced on her, the larger alicorn close enough that Celestia could feel the chill radiating from her body. “This world, I mean. Ponies enjoying your night sky, shunning me, being the big sister for a change. Is it what you really wanted?”

“No,” Nightmare Moon admitted, turning away, losing her nerve and blinking before Celestia. “This, all this, it’s sickening. They don’t love me for me, they’re just… blind. I could order them all to drown themselves and they’d happily walk into the waves.”

“Then what do you want?”

“Do you know how I was freed, Sister?” Nightmare Moon asked. “Two fillies decided to release me in the hopes that I would save them from Discord. A stupid idea, of course. It’s rather like trying to bait two dragons into attacking each other.”

“Twilight and Midnight, I assume.” Celestia sighed.

“Ah, yes. They did mention they were your students. I suppose their talent but total lack of common sense makes that rather obvious, in hindsight.”

Celestia frowned at that, though her small stature made it look more cute than upset.

“They, at least, had proper respect,” Nightmare Moon said, quietly. She chuckled weakly. “They weren’t afraid of me at all. No, for some reason they were glad to see me. I'm not sure if they're foolhardy or simply fools.”

“A thousand years is a long time. Even enough for a fresh start.”

“Some things never change,” Nightmare Moon said, sharply. “I want you to understand something, sister. I will defeat Discord. Equestria is mine by right, and I won’t have that idiotic draconequuis ruin it again. After that, I will see to you.”

“But only afterwards?” Celestia asked.

“One thing at a time,” Nightmare Moon retorted. “I can’t defeat both of you at once. Nor can you face me and the chaos spirit at the same time. We have scores to settle, but they will have to wait.”

“If you can save them, especially those fillies…” Celestia shook her head. “You can do what you want to me.”

“Oh good. That fits in well with my plan for escaping this place.” Nightmare Moon smiled widely, showing fangs. “We are, unfortunately, trapped in your dream, and so I need to wake you up. If it was my dream we wouldn’t need such theatrics.”

“What are you talking about?” Celestia asked. The way Nightmare Moon was looking at her made her worry.

“The fastest way to wake up from a dream,” Nightmare Moon said, her horn glowing. “Is to die in it.”

Chapter 28

Twilight was the last one to wake up, and by the time she was aware enough to register the voices of the ponies around her, they were already arguing.

“We have enough power between us to oppose him without needing the Elements,” Celestia insisted. She sounded caught somewhere between frustration and pleading.

“That may be,” Nightmare Moon admitted. It wasn’t growling, not quite, but it still brought to mind angry and possibly rabid animals. “But we will need the Elements to undo the damage he has already done, Celestia.”

“What’s going on?” Twilight asked. The world was spinning around her as if she was in some sort of poorly-constructed universe where the planet wasn’t at the center of the cosmos.

“We were having a discussion--” Celestia started, before her sister interrupted her.

“An argument,” Nightmare Moon corrected. “She’s not a foal.”

“We were arguing,” Celestia allowed, with a sigh that indicated she was only admitting they were arguing to forestall an argument about arguing, which was the kind of critical mass of frustration that might lead a pony to go insane and try to kill their sibling. “We were arguing about the Elements of Harmony.”

Nightmare Moon narrowed her eyes, clearing her throat and glaring across the room.

Twilight was awake enough to appreciate that they were, in fact, in a room now. She looked around at the ancient ruined stone and general decay of the place. It was a total dump.

“I agree,” Nightmare Moon said. Twilight realized her internal monologue wasn’t as internal as she’d have liked. “Somepony decided to move into the Canterlot palace instead of actually keeping ours in good condition.”

“That has nothing to do with-” Celestia closed her eyes and sighed. “Luna, we can’t use the Elements.” She gestured with one hoof at five stone balls. They didn’t look particularly magical. They just looked dusty.

“We’ve used them before,” Nightmare Moon countered. “You even used them all by yourself, as I distinctly recall. I could do the same.”

“No, Luna, it’s not that simple.” Celestia sighed. “After I used the Elements on you, I lost my connection to them. For the last thousand years they’ve been inert.”

“Inert for you, perhaps.”

“For everypony,” Celestia sighed.

“Wonderful,” Nightmare Moon spat. “You doomed Equestria even more surely than I ever could have. Where’s your annoying spawn? She can probably come up with something. From what I’ve been able to tell she’s smarter than you.”

“Princess Cadance is not my child!”

“I wasn’t talking about her, but I can see how you’d be confused with how many ponies here are brighter than the sun.”

Celestia’s expression was like somepony sucking on a lemon.

“They’re definitely related,” Midnight grumbled, as she trotted into the room. “Here.” She put a glass of water down next to Twilight. “And don’t even start making comparisons. I know you were thinking about some kind of sarcastic comment, because I was, too.”

“Have they been arguing this whole time?” Twilight asked.

“Mom said when she woke up they were already at it,” Midnight said. “But they were enemies for a thousand years, so this is sort of an improvement I guess.”

“Where did Princess Cadance and your mom go?”

“They’re in the library. Mom wanted to find everything she could on Discord.”

“There’s a library? Why aren’t we in the library?” Twilight stood up on shaking knees, willing to do anything if it meant books.

“Fine!” Celestia snapped. “Since I’m so stupid I’ll just shut up and let you take care of things! Go ahead, Luna! Prove me wrong - use the elements! I await your success with bated breath!”

“You know, I’m starting to see why they ended up fighting to the death,” Twilight whispered. She was smart enough to want to avoid getting dragged into the argument.

“Are you two arguing again?!” Cadance groaned, from the doorway. "All these books in Horse Latin are enough of a headache without screaming..."

“Cadance, will you please tell my sister that the Elements can’t be used?” Celestia said, refusing to look at Nightmare Moon.

“That’s not strictly true,” Sunset said. She was reading a book as she walked, and had a stack of others at her side. “According to a prophecy, they just need to find new ponies to use them. Sort of a standard chosen-ones type of thing. Clover the Clever said-”

“Exactly!” Nightmare Moon declared. “That only proves my point! They were inert while I was gone, and now that I am here to use them, they will reawaken!”

Nightmare Moon stalked over to the Elements.

“Awaken!” She ordered.

They reacted the same way most stone does when ordered, and did nothing.

“Come on, you stupid--” Nightmare Moon muttered, growling under her breath and nudged one with a hoof.

“I told you, they won’t work for us,” Celestia sighed.

“You didn’t let me finish!” Sunset snapped. “Clover the Clever said that six ponies would need to appear, one for each Element! We’ve got six ponies here and--”

“You broke them.” Nightmare Moon declared, glaring at her sister and ignoring Sunset.

Celestia sighed like steam escaping a kettle. “I didn’t break them!”

“Prophesy!” Sunset Shimmer threw the book at the two bickering sisters.

Eventually, things settled down, and they were able to talk to each other without the use of shield spells to deflect objects thrown for emphasis.

“Discord wasn’t always a danger,” Celestia said. “In fact, he used to be our friend.”

Nightmare Moon cleared her throat.

“He used to be my friend, at least.” Celestia stopped in front of an old, broken stained-glass window. “There’s a copy of this in Canterlot, but this is the original and, I think, superior.”

She cast a spell to repair the cracked glass and wipe away centuries of grime and dirt, revealing the image.

An alicorn of light and an alicorn of darkness, circling a distorted figure that could only be Discord.

“He was dangerously powerful but relatively harmless for a time,” Nightmare Moon said. “I never trusted him. You must understand that this was not long after Star Swirl vanished. The world wasn’t safe or tame. Celestia was better at making friends than I was.”

“And Luna was better at keeping us safe. She was always wiser than I, in some ways.”

Nightmare Moon looked pleased at the compliment.

“She saw the danger before I did,” Celestia continued. “Discord got bored easily, and as his powers grew he was less able to control exactly what they did.”

“It’s his greatest weakness,” Nightmare Moon added. “He has almost unlimited power but at best he can control the intent of his magic, and not the exact result. It does tend towards ironic ends, but his inability to dictate details is the reason all of us escaped.”

“That inability to control himself is why ponies feared him, even when he was trying to help,” Celestia said. “Replacing a ruined field of grain with trees that grow filled jam jars might be unexpected and technically edible, but there are very few ponies that want to eat bowls of jam for months on end just to survive the winter.”

“Or when he turned grass into sugar floss because he thought plain grass was dull. It all washed away in the rain, then the barren hillside had no roots holding it together and turned into a mudslide…” Nightmare Moon shook her head. “One bad decision led to compounding problems. He was never satisfied to leave things as they were.”

“There were some good things he did,” Celestia hastily put in. “He never intentionally hurt a pony, and healed the ones that did get hurt, even when it wasn’t his fault.”

“We tried to convince him to stop.”

“He did stop,” Celestia reminded Nightmare Moon. “For a little while.”

“What made him snap?” Sunset asked. “Did somepony die? An argument between sisters maybe?”

“It’s never just one thing,” Celestia said. “It takes time. His resentment built up, and I failed him as a friend by not seeing it happen.”

“He decided the world would be better if he was in charge,” Nightmare Moon said. “And that was that. We tried stopping him, failed, and he let us go. We spent decades trying to find a way to save Equestria.”

“We think it was decades, at least. It wasn’t just the sun and moon - time itself became unstuck. In some places, Discord had only taken over hours ago. In others, it had been generations. It’s one reason there are no real history books of the Discordant Era: there is no single narrative.”

“Eventually we found the Elements of Harmony,” Nightmare Moon said. “And with them we were able to seal Discord in stone - which is what we need to do again.”

“Where did you find them?” Cadance asked.

“Under this very castle,” Nightmare Moon said. “It’s the reason we had it built in the first place.”

“Well, maybe we should check there? There could be something we need to make them work again.” Cadance suggested.

“A tree?” Sunset asked, looking up at the huge crystal structure.

“It used to be smaller,” Celestia said. "Sort of a shrubbery."

“Look,” Twilight said, pushing sand aside. “The roots go down into the rock. It looks like a crystal, but it’s growing like a living thing instead of a mineral.”

“I wonder how deep it goes,” Midnight looked down into the crack. “Is it a plant? Are there more like it?”

“It’s definitely a magical structure,” Twilight said.

“We aren’t sure where it came from,” Nightmare Moon said, keeping her distance. She was wary of it, after her time on the moon. “Celestia and I found it when we were sheltering from a storm that was raining cats and dogs. And no, that is not a metaphor.”

“The Elements looked more like gems in the window art,” Sunset muttered, rapping her hoof against one of the stone balls. “What’s the plan, rub these against the tree and hope they recharge or something?”

“They’re…” Nightmare Moon grimaced. “Temperamental.”

“That’s putting it lightly,” Celestia mused. “After we fought, they refused to activate again for me, and Magic disappeared entirely.”

“Magic?” Twilight asked, looking up.

“Magic, Honesty, Loyalty, Laughter, Generosity, and Kindness,” Celestia explained. “The six Elements of Harmony.”

“You mean Sorcery, Strength, Bravery, Hope, Beauty, and Healing,” Nightmare Moon corrected. “They’re the Elements of Harmony, not Elements of bad translation from Horse Latin.”

“We’ve argued about this before, Luna. Neither of us could read Star Swirl’s hoofwriting well enough to tell!”

“Bah!” Nightmare Moon turned away. “If they were the Elements of Bickering we’d have them working by now.”

“What does Star Swirl have to do with it?” Sunset asked, turning away from a floating tracery of the magic floating off of the tree.

“That’s an excellent question,” Celestia said, with a sigh. “Sunset, you know how I have spent years trying to appear as an all-knowing, wise immortal mentor?”

“Yeah?”

“You know how sometimes I give you cryptic answers to questions and make you learn by finding things out for yourself?”

“Yeah…?”

“That’s because sometimes I’m faking it and I have no idea what to say,” Celestia said. “And I’m trying not to panic and I want to sound like I’m an authority because I spent a thousand years with no one to help me or confide in and I couldn’t ever say ‘I don’t know’ because then ponies start to panic and it causes the Recession of 439!”

“That was when the Neighponese tea trade collapsed,” Midnight helpfully chimed in.

“It happened because I forgot which fork was for the salad course!”

“Is that what all those nightmares were about?” Nightmare Moon asked, amused.

“You saw those?!”

“I could still see dreams from the Moon, sister, just as we were able to share a dream when you were trapped in the Sun.”

“You shared a dream?” Twilight asked.

“Yes, it was a twisted version of our own past,” Nightmare Moon replied. She pawed at the ground for the moment, thoughtful. “I’m not sure if he expected it to drive us apart or merely drive Celestia insane.”

“I had to suffer the same isolation and mistrust Luna did,” Celestia said. “It was educational.”

“Indeed,” Nightmare Moon nodded. “I think it backfired, though. It was rather pleasant for me.”

“You were lucky,” Cadance sighed. “Sunset and I were stuck in some strange world.”

“It was the Power Ponies,” Sunset specified.

“You got to meet the Power Ponies?!” Midnight gasped.

“Yeah,” Sunset grinned. “Turns out I’m stronger than all of them put together, though.”

“Well we got sent to bucking Tartarus,” Twilight said, flatly. “You all got to play around and he sent us to Pony Hell.”

“That’s because he knows you two are the most dangerous,” Sunset said, turning back to her analysis spell. “You’ve almost blown up Equestria in your spare time. He’s probably worried about what you’d do if you really put your minds to it.”

“Like that plan to blow up the moon,” Midnight agreed.

“The what to WHAT?!” Nightmare Moon sputtered.

“Any ideas?” Cadance asked. She sat down next to Sunset, trying to decipher the images flashing in front of the unicorn.

“We could cut it down to count the rings,” Sunset sighed. “Aside from that, I’ve got nothing. The Elements are totally inert to all scanning spells I’ve thrown at them, but I’m not sure what to make of that.”

“Pretend I went to Canterlot High and not the School for Gifted unicorns.”

“Cadance, I tutored you. I know you’re not an idiot.”

“I know, and I like it when you explain things to me.” She shifted closer to Sunset and wrapped a wing around her shoulders. “Brains are sexy.”

Sunset gave her a look.

“Okay fine, brains are gross wrinkly grey things, but you’re smart and I feel better when you tell me what’s going on,” Cadance sighed.

“I’ll believe that one,” Sunset said. “Okay, so, the Elements are these stone balls. And both Nightmare Moon and Celestia agree that they’re the real thing. The problem is, I can’t detect any magic, which means one of two things.”

“I suppose the first choice is that these are just rocks?” Cadance guessed.

“Yep. Or option two, they’re really powerful.”

Cadance tilted her head like a confused cat. Or pony, in this case.

“Extremely powerful artifacts, especially ancient ones, often lack any kind of detectable magical aura,” Sunset explained. “It’s like, um…” She tried to think of the kind of easily-explained and almost entirely incorrect metaphor that teachers always used to explain difficult concepts to their students to get them to stop asking difficult questions. “Think of an enchanted item as being like a balloon. It’s filled with magic and flaws in the enchantment allow it to slowly leak out, in the same way a balloon slowly deflates. The more magic it holds, the more pressure the balloon is holding back. With me so far?”

Cadance nodded slowly

“Beyond a certain point, the pressure is too much to handle for normal methods - like a rubber balloon popping from being overinflated. Powerful enchanted objects tend not to leak magic because if they had the same types of flaws, all the magic would explode out of them right away. In our metaphor, they’re more like steel oxygen tanks. There’s no detectable leakage, and any flaw becomes catastrophic. If an artifact is ancient, it’s lasted a long time without suffering that kind of catastrophic failure and so it has to be almost perfect.”

“That makes sense,” Cadance agreed.

“So if they’re really powerful artifacts more than a thousand years old, it’d be silly to expect to sense magic,” Sunset shrugged. “Unfortunately the same could be said about rocks.”

Twilight and Midnight sat with a stone sphere between them.

“Which one is this?” Midnight asked.

“Nightmare Moon said it was Strength,” Twilight muttered. “Then Celestia told her it was Honesty. Then they got into an argument about the translation again and Nightmare Moon said, and I’m paraphrasing, ‘if it’s Honesty it’s a wonder any of the feathering things ever worked for you’.”

“I’m starting to like Celestia’s plan of trying to overpower Discord,” Midnight admitted. “I’m sure Nightmare Moon is right that these are a more elegant solution but we can’t spend the next thousand years trying to figure out how to make them work.”

“It’s worth trying, though,” Twilight countered. “Nightmare Moon did say this cavern should be totally safe from Discord, so we’re not really in any danger as long as we stay here. We’ve got some time to work on the problem before we give up and brute force the answer.”

“So what do you think, drained of energy, or locked?” Midnight asked, changing the subject and nudging the ball with her hoof.

“Let’s assumed locked,” Twilight said. “If they’re drained of energy they’re useless. You know how hard it is to recharge a drained enchantment.”

“What is it, a theoretical maximum of 20% efficiency in transferring power into a drained item to recharge it?” Midnight asked. “And that’s if the item was designed to even be recharged in the first place.”

“We could hack something together, but anything strong enough to stop Discord would drain all of us, and there are six of them. So like I said, if they’re drained, we might as well go with plan F.”

Midnight mentally counted off plans until she got to F. “Throw rocks at him?”

“At least the Elements would still be good for that.”

“Before we use them as ammunition, let’s try unlocking them. You grabbed the book Sunset threw at the Princesses?”

“Sure,” Twilight pulled it out of her saddlebags. She flipped it open. “It’s prophesy, though, and you know what that’s like.”

“Light on specifics and useful information?” Midnight guessed.

“I’ve been thinking about it, though,” Twilight said. She started pacing while Midnight flipped through the painted and hoof-lettered pages, the book predating the advent of the printing press and, unfortunately, modern standards of spelling and grammar. “Discord went out of his way to separate us. He could have thrown all of us into Tartarus, or the moon, or turned us into stone.”

“Celestia said he wasn’t good with details.”

“This is more than just details. Think about it. Princess Celestia and Nightmare Moon had to relive the worst time in their lives. Your mom was forced to be a bad guy. Princess Cadance was a victim. We got stuck in Tartarus and in the end he tried to play us against each other. He was trying to drive us apart.”

“Oh feathers, I hope we don’t have to kiss or something to make these work.”

Twilight stumbled and gagged at that idea.

“Luna,” Celestia said, patiently.

Nightmare Moon waved a wing at her, dismissively, as she carefully rubbed one of the inert Elements against the Tree of Harmony.

“Luna,” Celestia sighed.

“I am busy,” Nightmare Moon muttered.

“You are not busy. You are trying everything that comes to mind no matter how unlikely it is to work.” She didn’t say stupid. She thought it, very hard, but she didn’t say it.

Nightmare Moon put the Element down and took a deep breath. She didn’t say it either, but she knew it was stupid.

“The first time all we did was grab them and it just… worked,” Nightmare Moon said. “We didn’t have to sit in front of the tree trying to figure it out while Equestria burned.”

Celestia sat down next to her. She considered trying to hug Luna with the same calculations one might make in evaluating how to console a depressed tiger.

“Don’t tell them this, but I had hoped this would be as easy as the first time.”

“Luna, the first time we fought him, you almost drowned in a lake of caramel sauce, and I spent a week as a potted plant.”

“Going by that metric, we’re ahead of the game,” Nightmare Moon snorted.

"I'm just worried. You know that dream I had--"

"It was a dream within a dream. It's possible it won't come true. Focus on victory."

Celestia swallowed, wishing she’d been able to get a few stiff drinks to brace herself. “After it’s over, and we’ve won, what will you do?”

“At this point I think planning anything is useless,” Nightmare Moon said. She nodded towards Twilight and Midnight. “Those two freed me years before I expected, and then instead of glorious revenge, I’m immediately required to save Equestria. And they haven’t said anything, but I suspect they’re not entirely blameless for Discord’s escape.”

“It wouldn’t shock me,” Celestia admitted, quietly. She didn’t want to embarrass her students in the middle of a world-ending crisis. “I took them on as my students partly to keep a close eye on them. Even so, they cause disasters on a nearly annual basis.”

“Ah, so you’re teaching them for the same reason Star Swirl taught us.”

“Exactly.”

Nightmare Moon chuckled, just a little.

“I missed this.” Celestia said. “I spent a thousand years hating myself and worrying. I missed just being able to spend time with my sister.”

“It would be better if the world wasn’t in peril.”

“But if it wasn’t, we’d be at each other’s throats,” Celestia said. Her expression fell and her shoulders slumped. “Maybe that’s why the Elements aren’t working.”

“Because we’re enemies?” Nightmare Moon mused. “If that was the case, all we would have to do is stop being enemies. Wonderful.”

“No matter what happens, Luna, I won’t fight you again,” Celestia said. “I made the wrong choice last time. I neglected you because I thought I was doing what was needed for Equestria. If I’d been smarter and sided with you instead of ignoring your concerns, I could have kept you from being traumatized, we wouldn’t be having this problem now, and I’d be able to sleep more than a few hours at a time.”

Nightmare Moon raised an eyebrow.

“It’s true! Between hunting monsters and having to keep the sun and moon in order, court and paperwork all day…” Celestia huffed. “If it wasn’t for Sunset and Cadance taking up a few of my duties I’d be so sleep deprived I’d fall asleep halfway through fighting Discord.”

That got a more genuine laugh out of Nightmare Moon.

“And worse, with you gone I haven’t been able to get a real night’s rest. It’s just been constant, well…”

“Nightmares?”

“Nightmares about Nightmares, among other things. You used to keep everypony safe from things like that.”

“You know I wanted to keep everypony happy and safe,” Nightmare Moon said. “And they rejected me.”

“I saw it from the front row seats in that dream.”

“When I came back, the first thing I saw were ponies excited for my return. They knew who I was and they went out of their way to bring me back. They didn’t pity me or hate me, they were excited and wanted me to save them.” Nightmare Moon sighed. “I enjoyed it. That’s why I can’t let them down.”

“Even if it means putting aside your grudge with me?”

“Keep asking and I may change my mind.”

“What was that?” Sunset leaned in closer, the illusory display moving with her. She grunted in annoyance and recast the spell, fixing it in place and focusing it in a new spot.

“What was what?” Cadance asked.

“There was some kind of burst in the magical flow from the Tree,” Sunset said. “I’m not sure what caused it…” She looked around the room. “Hey, whatever you were doing a minute ago, do it again!”

Celestia looked at Nightmare Moon. Nightmare Moon glanced at the magic circle Twilight had started drawing and which looked worryingly like an implosion lens. Midnight did her best to look casual.

“Which one of us?” Celestia asked, after the moment of confusion passed.

“I don’t know! But the Tree started moving a lot of magic-”

“To where, exactly?” Nightmare Moon asked, cutting her off.

Sunset pointed.

“That was…” Nightmare Moon narrowed her eyes in concentration. “Hope? I think?”

“I believe you’re right,” Celestia said. “But…” She stood and turned. “The actual Element is over on the other side of the room. None of us did anything to it.”

“How can you even tell which is which?” Twilight asked.

Celestia stepped closer and ‘accidentally’ smudged part of the magical array, disarming it. “There’s a feeling to them. You never forget it. It’s like… an old friend. You can spend years and years apart, then you see them again and it all comes back.”

“Hope was one of mine,” Nightmare Moon said. She grunted as she stood up. “Blasted Equuis gravity…”

“Is gravity different on the moon?” Twilight asked.

“We’ll discuss it later,” Nightmare Moon said. “For now we must deal with matters of greater gravitas than gravity.”

“Oh my stars, Luna,” Celestia groaned.

“It was a good pun.”

“It was terrible.”

“That is exactly why it is a good pun,” Nightmare Moon countered. She leaned down to look closely at Hope. “Now, if the Tree is feeding energy to this, then perhaps bringing them here was all we needed to do. It would not surprise me if--”

Her hoof contacted the surface of the stone sphere, and it shattered.

Nightmare Moon looked down at the shards.

The swear she used cannot be repeated in polite company.

“Wow, the readings just skyrocketed! Do that again!” Sunset said. She was watching her displays instead of the room and ignoring the way Cadance was urgently trying to get her attention.

“That might be difficult,” Nightmare Moon said. “I-- Hm.” She paused, then cast a spell that instantly swapped her with Celestia in a flash of teleportation. “Celestia broke it!”

“Luna! That hasn’t worked since we were foals!”

“It worked on Star Swirl and he is-” (or was, the historical record is shockingly unclear on this point) “-one of the most brilliant minds in Equestria.”

“Whatever, whatever,” Sunset said, still not listening. “I think something’s about to-”

There was a flash of silver light like someone had turned moonlight into a blinding strobe.

Reactions from the ponies were varied. Sunset had thrown herself on top of Cadance to protect her from what had looked like an uncontrolled magical surge. Cadance had frozen like a terrified statue. Twilight and Midnight had both tried to cast the same shield spell at the same time while in close proximity and ended up sending each other bouncing across the room like rubber balls. Celestia, like always, maintained her poise and grace and definitely hadn’t made a strangled sound like a surprised duck.

Nightmare Moon’s reaction was to grab at her peytral.

“What happened?!” She tugged at the metal, trying to get away from it. The sensation had been somewhere between a warm hug and elastic snapping back into place. She had a sudden image of her armor having flash-heated to molten ruin, and the panic didn’t abate until she’d gotten it off of her neck and gotten a look at it.

The blue-black metal had been warped to allow a large gem to sit comfortably in the center, a pale blue crescent moon radiating magic, light glinting off of it in rainbows like it had passed through a prism.

“It just seems odd that Laughter would awaken for Luna, is all,” Celestia said.

“Mmhmm,” Sunset said, distracted.

“I’m not saying she’s unworthy. Obviously she’s worthy. I’m just--” Celestia leaned closer to whisper into Sunset’s ear. “She was going to plunge the world into eternal night and I’m not entirely clear on how that fits in with Laughter! Or Hope, for that matter, if we go with her translation.”

Nightmare Moon’s cackle echoed through the cavern.

Sunset looked up at Celestia and shrugged. “Maybe that counts?”

“This is great!” Twilight pranced around Nightmare Moon. “That means we can save Equestria!”

“It’s definitely progress,” Midnight agreed.

Nightmare settled down on the stone so she didn’t have to look quite so far down at the fillies. She adjusted the peytral, though in truth it was already perfectly seated. It was somewhere between a nervous tic and the vain preening of a peacock.

“Let’s save the excitement for after we get the others, hm?” Nightmare Moon suggested.

“Right,” Midnight said. She grabbed one of the orbs. “All we have to do is smash them!”

“Eeeh!” Celestia’s golden aura surrounded it just before the filly could try cracking it like a nut. “What have I told you, girls, repeatedly?”

“Don’t attempt to teleport into solid objects,” Twilight said.

“What have I told you girls that is relevant to this situation?” Celestia corrected.

“Don’t attempt destructive experimentation on anything you can’t replace,” Midnight sighed.

Celestia cleared her throat.

“Especially not on ponies, small animals, and irreplaceable magical artifacts,” Twilight mumbled.

“There you go,” Celestia said, sitting next to her sister.

“I think I understand what happened,” Cadance said.

“Please, do explain,” Celestia motioned for her to go on.

“I think the Elements awaken in reaction to a need, not a desire, and they can only be used by ponies they choose,” Cadance continued. “Hope woke up, because Nightmare Moon was brought here by the wishes of two fillies that thought she could save Equestria, and she took up that role and set her own grudge aside.”

“There are simply bigger fish to fry, to use a Griffonian phrase,” Nightmare Moon said, with a mild shrug. “A common foe like Discord cannot be ignored.”

"Now we just need to awaken Celestia's connection," Sunset said.

“I can’t use them anymore,” Celestia said. She looked down at her hooves, unable to meet Sunset’s gaze. “They're a symbol of harmony and unity. I lost my connection because I abused their power. I thought I was doing the right thing by doing what duty demanded. I was wrong.”

“And you learned that sometimes loyalty to your friends and your family is more important than duty,” Sunset said. She swallowed, looking away and taking a few moments to gather her words. “That’s why you kept giving me chances, even though I wasn’t a very good student.”

“You were an excellent student,” Celestia countered. “Just troubled.”

“I was cruel to the ponies around me. I didn’t respect anypony. I didn’t listen to you when you were trying to help. If you’d given up on me when everypony else told you to, I don’t know where I’d be today.”

“I’d never give up on you, Sunset.” Celestia whispered. “You’re like a daughter to me.”

“That’s what it means to be loyal. It means sticking by other ponies even when they might be a lost cause, or trusting them even when you’ve wronged each other.”

One of the orbs cracked on its own.

A lance of ruby light struck Celestia’s chest, and a red sun took the place of the amethyst that had occupied her peytral, the gem gleaming like it was sitting under the summer sky.

“Well,” Celestia said. “As long as we’re going around, Princess Cadance--”

“Kindness,” Twilight said.

“Yep, Kindness,” Midnight agreed.

“Kindness. Definitely.” Sunset nodded.

“I still think Healing is a better translation,” Nightmare Moon grumbled.

Cadance didn’t get to say anything before the Element broke open like an egg and a pink heart was hammered into place on her jewelry.

“Really? Just like that?” Cadance asked.

“I don’t know what to say,” Sunset shrugged. “Nopony else in the world would put up with me. I think the Royal Guard owe you a couple medals for service to the Crown.”

“I am 'the Crown.'”

“They’ll make an exception for you,” Sunset retorted, pecking her on the cheek.

“Perhaps there is something to your prophecy theory,” Nightmare Moon admitted. “Six ponies here, at a time of need. Of course, it’s obvious what you would represent.”

“Magic?” Midnight guessed.

“No,” Nightmare Moon said. “Well, perhaps. But there’s something that fits even better.”

“Well it can’t be Honesty,” Sunset said. “I’m not a huge liar, but Celestia still doesn’t know how many nights I spent in the Black Archives.”

“When were you in the--” Celestia started, before her sister cut her off.

“That’s because as I keep saying, Honesty is a bad translation. It should more properly be called Strength, or perhaps Conviction.” Nightmare Moon raised her chin. “You have more power than any unicorn I’ve ever known, and more than that, you have the drive and will to see your will done in the world.”

“It’s why I trusted you to find a way to stop Discord,” Celestia added. “I knew that you wouldn’t give up. When you set your mind to something, you don’t quit. Like when you decided you were going to find the truth about a certain mirror.”

A fourth Element opened, and energy crackled through the air towards Sunset.

“Wait, I’m not wearing any jewelry!”

She didn’t have time to dodge and had a sudden image of herself with a gemstone embedded in her skin like some kind of inadvisable, magical body modification.

Instead, when the light faded, an amber sun hung around her neck on a lacework of gold wire.

“That is Strength,” Nightmare Moon said, approval in her voice. “That is power. Not just steel, but the hoof that wields it.”

Twilight and Midnight both looked at the last orb, the one they’d been experimenting with.

“So then this one is either Beauty or Sorcery,” Twilight said.

“Well if it’s Beauty, you can have it,” Midnight said. “You’re not too bad looking.”

“I’d feel flattered if we weren’t identical.” Twilight giggled. “But even with Sorcery, we both share our magic.”

“Sister did say she misplaced Magic,” Nightmare Moon said. “Five orbs, but there are six elements. Do you have any idea where it might have gotten to?”

“Magic was always the most reclariant,” Celestia said. She stood and walked over to the two fillies. “It was a focus, like the general of an army. And just like a general, it was nothing without the rest to back it up.”

Sunset shrugged. “Nightmare Moon is wrong about the translation on that one, though. It’s definitely Generosity. And the reason there’s only one there is because for the last seven years these two have been learning about how to share your magic.”

“You can’t be serious,” Twilight deadpanned.

“I’m very serious.”

“You’re saying we’re stuck like this--” Midnight started.

“--because of some prophecy--” Twilight continued.

“--which we don’t even get a say in--”

“--and it’s all just a lesson about sharing?!” They finished at the same time.

The sphere split cleanly in half before the inner edges burst into light, the stone melting and flying up around them like sparks from a bonfire.

When the swirling lights cleared, Twilight and Midnight wore identical necklaces. Nearly identical. They had a pattern of gold and silver filigree, a gem in the center shaped like their cutie marks, but the gold and silver were reversed for each of them, and the gem…

“What color is that?” Twilight asked, trying to see her own Element.

“It kind of shifts depending on how you hold it, like a butterfly wing or a soap bubble,” Midnight said, tilting her head.

"Weird," Twilight said, poking the gem.

“Sort of indigo and violet,” Midnight agreed. She tilted her necklace and watched the color shift in the light. At the same time, Twilight’s Element changed the other way, like they were connected.

Twilight was smart enough to realize that was almost certainly the exact case. They probably were connected.

“That’s very interesting,” Celestia said, craning her neck to look closely. “I can’t tell which is which.”

“This isn’t how the elements were, a thousand years ago,” Nightmare Moon said. “But that may work to our advantage.”

“I agree,” Celestia nodded. “Discord’s greatest strength was his unpredictability. It makes his magic almost impossible to counter, and planning against him is often foolhardy. But if we can surprise him like this…”

“It’s going to work,” Sunset said, confidently.

Chapter 29

Sunset looked at the castle through the telescope spell, a lens of distorted air hanging in front of her.

“You were right. All the guards are…” She waffled a bit before settling on a word. “Monochrome, and they’re acting strangely. Some of them are patrolling, but the rest are just milling around and a few are sleeping or crying.”

“That’s what I was worried about,” Nightmare Moon sighed. “Come away from the edge lest they spot you.”

Sunset dropped the spell and carefully took a few steps back, the cloud under her hooves making it like walking on a too-soft mattress.

“If you fall through, I’ll catch you,” Cadance assured her.

“You won’t fall, though,” Midnight said. “It’s a very stable spell. It should last for a full day.”

“So why are they gray?” Sunset asked, sitting down and flailing for a moment as she started to fall backwards until Celestia steadied her.

“Discord had a way of changing ponies,” Celestia explained. “He would reach inside them with his magic and twist them around.”

“It was sometimes like an infection,” Nightmare Moon added. “A pony would seem normal, if somewhat ill-tempered - which was hardly unusual considering the world was dissolving into chaos - and they would slowly become one of his puppets. The sure sign of his influence was the color of their coat and mane. As his discordant magic infected them, they would become gray and pale.”

“Clover the Clever thought it was because the magic of harmony was drained from them. A cutie mark is a sign of harmony magic and achieving a kind of epiphany about yourself, and is represented by colorful images. Discord’s infection is about a denial of that magic and losing yourself, and all the color drains from you.”

“Oh right, the old thamochromelanin theory,” Sunset muttered.

“Never disproven,” Celestia reminded her.

“That town where you summoned me,” Nightmare Moon interrupted. “Hollow Shades? Do you remember how all the ponies were grey or otherwise pale?”

“And they were a little different from the rest of Equestria,” Cadance put in.

“I thought they were nice,” Twilight muttered.

“I worry that something similar might have happened to them,” Nightmare Moon admitted. “It may well be my fault. They turned their devotion into a religion, and that can do strange things to otherwise sensible ponies.”

“We’ll investigate it after we deal with this,” Celestia said. “Thoughts on our approach? You were always better at this than I was.”

“I haven’t had time to study the castle,” Nightmare Moon said. She waved her hoof, and a replica of the castle rose up out of the cloud they were using to observe Canterlot without being spotted. “Let’s begin with the most obvious route. We could go through the front doors.”

“The guards aren’t in any real shape to stop us, but they’d get in the way,” Sunset said. “We might have to really hurt some of them to get through, and it would give Discord plenty of warning we were on the way.”

“Unfortunate,” Nightmare Moon muttered.

“I’d like to avoid any plan where we would hurt innocent ponies.” Cadance sat next to Sunset. “They’re victims, not enemies.”

“Any plan where we would have a serious confrontation with the Royal Guard is problematic,” Twilight said. “If I were Discord, I’d use them as living shields. Attacks from us that would stun him are too dangerous to use with them around, and he can delay us indefinitely by using spells that endanger them and force us to waste time saving them.”

Nightmare Moon raised an eyebrow.

“I read a lot of military theory books growing up.” Twilight blushed.

“What about back doors?” Midnight asked. “The castle is like a maze. There have to be tons of secret passages.”

“And with the guards disorganized we can slip in easily!” Twilight agreed.

“I doubt that Discord will have left them undefended,” Nightmare Moon said. “He is no fool, despite how he acts.”

“When I had the castle built, Canterlot had a significant mining operation,” Celestia said. “The entire mountain is honeycombed with caves - it’s more like a geode the size of a mountain than anything else.”

“I never knew that,” Sunset muttered.

“The mines were shut down centuries ago. At this point, they’re little more than a footnote in the city’s history. Discord likely has no idea they exist, and he’s unlikely to stumble on them.”

“Can we get close to the castle?” Nightmare Moon asked.

“The lowest foundations of the castle connect directly to them,” Celestia said. “Not only can we get close to the castle, but the construction will make it obvious.”

“Obvious, you said,” Sunset grumbled and swung the cone of light she was projecting across the cavern. Crystals reflected the light at crazy angles, and corridors, only some of them actually traversable, went off in every direction. Left, right, forward, back, up, down, and in crazy spirals that quickly erased any sense of where they actually were inside the mountain.

“You could wander down here for weeks and never get anywhere,” Cadance agreed.

“Admittedly I never explored these caverns myself,” Celestia said, the echoes of her quiet voice lingering for long seconds in the darkness.

“And if we use scrying spells, he will notice us at once,” Nightmare Moon grumbled.

“Disc--” Twilight started to say, before Nightmare Moon’s hoof covered her mouth.

“Even saying his name is dangerous, this close to the castle,” she warned. “Names have power. I’m sure as a foal you would hide under your blankets with a child’s belief that if they cannot see the monsters, the monsters cannot see them? This is unfortunately similar.”

Midnight made an arrow pointing back the way they came with a piece of chalk.

“We should head generally South,” she declared. “The castle is on the South face of the mountain, so if we go South and keep heading upwards as much as possible, we’ll eventually find something.”

“And which way is South?” Twilight asked.

“Normally I can tell,” Cadance said, looking around. “It’s sort of a pegasus thing, but for some reason it’s not working.”

“Compasses don’t work down here either,” Celestia said. “There are magnetic minerals in the walls. However, East is that way.” She inclined her head, pointing with her horn.

“Sun thing?” Sunset asked.

Celestia nodded.

“You sure that’s still reliable with Discord playing ping-pong with the sky?”

“I…” Celestia hesitated. “Probably.”

“We could split up,” Sunset suggested, only to be met with a barrage of ‘no’s and a few sharp glares.

“That’s a rookie mistake, Mom!” Midnight protested. “Do you know what happens when ponies split up? They fall into pit traps!”

“It’s not always pit traps,” Twilight added. “Sometimes it’s falling blocks.”

“The worst is disappearing blocks over a bottomless pit.”

“Especially if there are invisible blocks just where you want to jump so you hit your head and fall in.”

Midnight and Twilight nodded in mutual agreement. That had been the day the knew they’d pushed Shining Armor a little too far as an adversarial Game Master.

“I wish I could say that was unlikely,” Nightmare Moon muttered, her head lowered. The ceiling wasn’t quite that low but talk of invisible blocks was making her very aware of bumping into anything. She would never admit it, but she was used to being rather shorter.

“Pits are a very real possibility,” Celestia agreed. “Even if our adversary isn’t aware we’re here, this is a mine that has gone untended for many years. Don’t blindly trust anything to carry your weight.”

Celestia took a step forward, still looking back at the others and not watching her hooves. Her weight, which was somewhat more than the public records would indicate, came down in just the wrong spot. A crack opened up and the floor started to shake. Support beams cracked.

Celestia only had a moment to act, shoving Twilight out of the way.

"Feathers," the Princess swore, just as a dozen tons of rock slammed into her from above.

Sunset coughed and sneezed, spitting up almost jet-black mucus from all the rock and coal dust in the air. She cast a quick spell to clear out the clouds of debris and found herself looking at a wall of rock, pebbles still trickling down the sloped face.

“Did everypony get out?” She yelled.

“I’m okay!” Midnight called, and Sunset felt herself relax a little.

“I made sure Twilight got to safety,” Celestia yelled, her voice muffled. “I’ll need some time to free myself without causing further damage to the mine, but I am in no real danger.”

“Is Cadance with you?” Sunset asked.

“Don’t-” Cadance was cut off by a sneeze. “Don’t worry! I’m just-” she sneezed three more times in rapid succession. “Trying to catch my breath!”

“I’m fine too, though none of you asked,” Nightmare Moon growled.

“It would take more than rocks to make me worry after you, sister,” Celestia said, her voice strained.

“I think I can teleport to you,” Midnight shouted.

“Don’t!” Sunset snapped.

“It’s too dangerous,” Celestia agreed. “Without a clear picture of your destination, you could do serious harm to yourself. Using that sort of magic will almost certainly attract our enemy’s attention, as well.”

“Do you think this cave-in was his doing?” Nightmare Moon asked.

“No, it was too nearly lethal for that.”

“We don’t have time to clear a path.”

“I am painfully aware of how much rock fell,” Celestia agreed, with sarcasm poorly hiding the strain she was under. “It appears that despite the risk of pit traps, we will have to split up. It’s likely these tunnels all connect somewhere. Try to get to the castle, or at least aboveground.”

“So now we trust blindly in luck?”

“Just like the old days, sister,” Celestia said. “I’ll wait a few minutes before I start shifting the stone, just in case it causes further damage. I’d suggest you all spread out before then.”

Midnight stepped quietly through the darkness, a wan light from her horn only illuminating a few steps ahead of her. She slowly let it brighten and sighed in annoyance as a million more motes of pink light shone around her.

“It’s like a hall of mirrors,” she whispered, lowering the light level again. She’d get less lost just watching her hooves than trusting her eyes in here.

Just as things plunged into darkness, she spotted something in the corner of her eye that didn’t belong.

“Hello?” She called out, wincing as it echoed. Alone in the dark, it felt wrong to make much noise.

She thought she heard a whisper.

Midnight trotted over, trying not to make any noise, a somewhat futile effort on the hard stone.

Standing among the crystals was a huge, ornate mirror, easily as tall as Celestia. The silver surface gleamed unnaturally, like it was reflecting light that just wasn’t there.

“I thought you could use a little reminder of where you came from,” Discord whispered.

Midnight spun around, looking for him, lighting up the cavern and seeing a thousand reflected copies doing the same.

She saw her face and wondered if it was a trick of the light or if she really did look that afraid.

“Where are you?” She demanded.

“Oh, around,” Discord said. Midnight thought she saw something in the reflections, far away, a ghost in mirrors reflecting mirrors.

“I’m warning you, if you--”

“I”m not here to stop you,” Discord said, his voice soothing. "I have a soft spot for foals. And luckily for you, for children of all kinds. Otherwise I would have left you in Tartarus.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Your teacher has been keeping secrets from you for years. It’s a bad habit of hers. I wouldn't trust her if I were you. Why don’t you--” now the voice sounded like it was close, speaking from three inches behind the back of her head. “--turn around?”

Midnight spun, facing the mirror again.

What was reflected wasn’t a pony. It was one of the odd bipeds she’d seen off and on in her nightmares. It was familiar, somehow, in the same way that things in a dream sometimes just made sense, like they were labeled. She reached out, and it moved to match her as well as their differing anatomies would allow. Just as they touched, the surface of the mirror split, a jagged crack splitting the surface and the silver finish tarnishing.

Midnight fell back in alarm.

The mirror was gone. It had just been an illusion. She was just facing a crystal, the same as the thousands of others around her.

The crack running down the surface was really there, though.

“Alone again?”

Cadance paused but didn’t panic. There wasn’t much point in panic when you knew you couldn’t really do anything.

“I don’t suppose you know the way out?” Cadance asked.

A shadow slid across the wall, curling into a crude shadow-puppet of a draconequuis, which for a human would require not only both hands but some additional help from a porcupine and an octopus to get right. A pony using their hooves wouldn't even be able to start.

“I have to admit I didn’t expect that,” Discord said.

“It never hurts to try asking nicely.”

“Well now I’d feel like a heel if I didn’t help, and I look awful in pumps.” The shadow turned into an arrow pointing to the right. “Go that way.”

“Thank you,” Cadance said, with a slight curtsey as she followed his direction.

“And you’re even trusting my advice! I’m not sure if you’re brave or foolish.”

“Sunset says they’re the same thing, and you only get to label it after it’s over.”

“She’s a smart pony. It’s too bad she won’t last very long.”

Cadance’s steps slowed.

“It's sad, what happens to our little mortal friends,” Discord said, the shadow swooping along the edge of the light Cadance was creating like a sea serpent swimming in a sea of darkness. “You like her, for some bizarre reason.”

“She’s passionate.”

“I’m not here to criticize your taste in mares. I don’t think I want to try winning that argument against the Princess of Love. Shall we say I concede that point to your expertise?”

“If you like.”

“You should ask your Aunt Tia about all the special friends she’s had over the centuries. Most of them lasted a few decades, and then…” he shrugged. “Maybe she can give you a few tips on how to cope.”

“Stop it.” Cadance folded her ears back, trying to block his words out.

“I’m just trying to help.”

Nightmare Moon stalked through the darkness, stopping in the center of a cavern lined with stalactites like jagged teeth. She narrowed her eyes and slowly turned her head, looking into the pitch-black gloom.

She snapped to the side and fired a blast that tore a jagged crater into the rock, the cavern vibrating under her hooves.

“That would have really hurt if your aim had been better,” Discord admitted.

Nightmare Moon hissed and jumped to the side, flapping to give herself some distance despite the low ceiling.

“So, you come to face me in single combat,” Nightmare Moon crowed, landing with her hooves spread to absorb the recoil as she fired again, the beam hitting Discord and passing through him harmlessly. His image blurred and faded for a moment, ghostlike.

“Not exactly,” Discord said. “I’d explain the details but you’ve never been the type to care much about learning for the sake of learning.”

“I don’t need details to tell this is a distraction,” Nightmare Moon declared, turning her back on him and walking away.

“The only exit is the other way,” Discord offered helpfully.

Nightmare Moon turned and walked towards the exit, her cheeks red.

“Have you given any thought to what you’ll do after you beat me?” Discord asked. “I’m just curious.” He got in front of her again, holding a camera and microphone. “Just a little soundbite, one season-opener villain to another? It'd look great in the commercials during the hiatus.”

“That’s no concern of yours,” Nightmare Moon closed her eyes and stepped through him, not even feeling the chill of walking through a ghost.

“How rude,” Discord huffed. “Your sister has plenty of plans. I just assumed you had a few too. At least a plan for how to avoid another vacation to the moon.”

“Idiot. I’m wielding one of the Elements. She couldn’t use them against me no matter what she was planning!”

“Last time you two fought you had half of them, in theory, and she still got them to work for her. Do you really think she’s done nothing in the last thousand years but plan a welcome back party for her estranged sister?” Discord chuckled.

“Silence!” NIghtmare Moon ordered, firing another blast. But his image wasn’t even there, and the spell hit nothing but the dark.

Twilight followed the path as it spiraled upwards. After what felt like an hour, it finally opened up into a huge, dripping space.

“If there’s water here, maybe I’m near the surface,” Twilight muttered. She checked the books in her saddlebags again, hoping that a book on cave formation would appear on its own if she spent enough time underground. No such luck yet.

Twilight wasn’t looking and almost tripped and fell on her face when her hoof hit the steel rail.

“This is perfect!” Twilight grinned and followed them further uphill. It had taken a long time, but now she had a sign that she was going the right way. They’d have to lead outside eventually.

Someone clapped behind her.

“Good work!” Discord said. His image had appeared on a wooden sign that had gone half-rotten in the damp space. He stopped and took out a feather duster, cleaning cobwebs and dust from inside.

“I’m warning you, I have-”

“One of the Elements,” Discord shrugged. “Well, one of them on average, anyway. Which one is it again?”

“That’s- it’s not important!” Twilight glared.

“Even if you did know, just one on its own isn’t much good, and what you have is more like half of two.”

“One and half of two is the same thing!”

“Ah, so half an oatmeal cookie and half a chocolate chip cookie are the same as one whole cookie? Most bakers would disagree.”

“What do you want?”

“I thought about sending you to Tartarus again, but that seems a little mean, especially since everything that’s happened isn’t your fault.” Discord’s wood-cut image gave a crooked smile. “You’ve come under some bad influences lately, after all. I mean, summoning Nightmare Moon? What would your mother think?”

“It was a good idea!”

“Equestria has a strict one-apocalypse-at-a-time limit, young lady, and you’re going to have to pay a stiff fine. I might be willing to waive it, though. If you do a little favor for me.”

“I’m not going to help you with anything. You threw me into Tartarus!”

“And I apologized! I promise next time I have to imprison someone, I’ll do it in a boardgame. Everyone loves Candy Land. Except for diabetics, I suppose, but that problem would sort itself out pretty quickly unless they found the Insulin Archipelago.”

“I should just--”

“I’m not even really here, so let’s not get ahead of ourselves with thoughts of solving problems with brute force. That’s more your rival’s thing, anyway. You’re the smart one, aren’t you? Think your way out of the problem.”

“You wouldn’t be bothering with talking if you could just stop me here.”

Discord raised a talon.

“Unless it was more fun this way,” he corrected.

“Fine. Either you can’t or won’t stop me right now. And you aren’t a very good distraction. But you went out of your way to point out that I’m sharing an Element. You wanted to try and drive a wedge between me and Midnight.”

Discord clapped, amused.

“Close. I wanted to point out that things would be better for you if she wasn’t here. You’d have a whole destiny instead of having to share with somepony else. And it would be better for her. She’s got a family, a real one, back where she came from.”

“Are you actually going to tell me where she's from?” Twilight blinked.

“It’s not something a Princess would tell you.” Discord said, a black robe appearing around his distorted form. “Maybe you should be asking her why she never tried to send her back?”

The wooden sign burst into multicolored flames on its own, the image vanishing among the embers.

In the flare of light, Twilight spotted a door down a passage that could only lead outside, and ran towards it, away from the flames and implications.

“Okay, that was step one,” Sunset said to herself. She looked up at the huge blocks and archways. “Find the castle undercroft and foundations.”

She couldn’t see any doors. She couldn’t see stairs, either, and they’d be even more useful.

“I wonder if self-levitation would be noticed,” she muttered. She’d have just shrugged and teleported if the wards on the castle weren’t preventing it. She hadn’t been allowed to put in any backdoors to the protection, either.

“I doubt it,” Discord said. “I’m not very observant.”

“Yeah, otherwise--”

Sunset stopped and looked to the left.

“Horseapples.”

“Language!” Discord gasped. “What would your daughter think if she heard you talking like that?”

“She’d wonder why I wasn’t just blasting you into atoms.”

“You know, I’m not sure if I am made of atoms. I don’t like to look too closely. Self-reflection has never been one of my virtues. We have that in common.”

“I’ve done plenty of reflecting.” Sunset started charging up her horn, then let it bleed out slowly without casting a spell. “You’re just trying to rile me up.”

“Guilty as charged.” Discord grinned. “I could turn the castle foundations to jelly but it’s more amusing to trick someone else into causing property damage than doing it myself.”

“No thanks,” Sunset said. “I do enough of that on my own.”

“Well, we don’t always get what we want,” Discord conceded. “You didn’t get wings, for example. Even trying to follow the straight and narrow, giving up your ambition, helping to raise the next generation, none of it was enough for Tia to trust you with the secret.”

Sunset’s look brought to mind a basilisk, because meeting it was almost certain death.

“It’s not my fault,” Discord said, raising his talons defensively. “I’ve never done anything to hurt you. At worst I gave you and your beau a little vacation.”

“You made me the villain!”

“You enjoyed it, admit it. Solving problems with violence is definitely your forte, little miss monster slayer.”

“What’s your point?”

“Well, I’ve already done the forbidden knowledge gag with another horse today, so I’ll just give you a loaner.”

“A what?”

Discord plucked the wings from his back and popped them onto Sunset’s sides.

“Don't say I never gave you anything,” Discord said, folding his talons.

Sunset flapped the mismatched wings cautiously, rising into the air. She looked up at the castle’s underbelly, then back to Discord.

He winked and vanished, but the wings remained.

“You look like you could use some help,” Discord said.

The weight of the rocks above Celestia lessened, and she managed to wiggle out of the pile pinning her down.

“Thank you,” she said, brushing herself off.

“You sounded almost genuine when you said that,” Discord noted. He snapped his talons, and her coat was left spotlessly white.

“That’s because I meant it,” Celestia said. She looked at Discord. “You were always my friend, Discord. I didn’t turn you to stone because I wanted to. I did it because I had to protect Equestria.”

“Ah yes, the same justification you used to put your sister in time-out.” Discord gestured down the sole passage available to them. “After you.”

Celestia started walking. She didn’t have much choice in where to go. “I was hoping we would have a chance to talk.”

“As I recall, your first reaction to my waking up was to try and disintegrate me with magic. That’s considered very rude in some cultures. All of them, actually.” Discord twisted through the air next to her like a swirl of smoke.

“I was worried for those closest to me. I apologize for being so rude.”

“Since it didn’t work, I suppose I can forgive you,” Discord grinned. “I’m a little disappointed. You came here with a plan to kill me, your oldest friend.”

“If you surrender, we can end this without fighting. We don’t even have to use harsh words. We can just sit down and talk this out like the old friends we are.”

“I doubt your sister will allow it,” Discord shrugged. “Besides, there was one thing I wanted to talk to you about because it worries me.”

“Oh?”

“That dream I trapped you in. Part of it wasn’t my doing, and I’m not sure it was dear Luna’s, either. She didn’t even try to interfere until she’d already had her fun.”

“You’re talking about the vision,” Celestia said, stopping. The path forked.

“So that’s what one of your visions is like?” Discord rubbed his chin. “Interesting. And you saw that someone was going to betray you. Don’t they always come true?”

“Unfortunately,” Celestia agreed, quietly.

“Ah well, I’ll let you figure it out. I’ll make sure we get the good china out for you and the other royalty attending today.”

Discord vanished in a flash, and Celestia tried to decide which way to go. After a moment, a second flash sparked above her head, and a tiny scrap of paper fluttered down in front of her. She grabbed it with her magic and read the rough hoofwriting.

“Try going right, and pick up dessert for the party,” Celestia read. She sighed and trotted down the right path.

Invaders had never actually attacked Canterlot Palace. Situated almost at the center of the nation, it was far from the front lines of any combat. One would need a fleet of airships, powerful teleportation magic, or a dereliction of duty among the EUP forces that hadn’t been seen in centuries (specifically, since the time of High General Eggs Benedict, who tried to sell the Wonderbolts to Griffonstone).

The Royal Guard mostly helped civilians who got lost in the palace or needed to get lost because they were somewhere they weren’t supposed to be. If push came to shove and they had to fight an organized resistance, they’d probably fold faster than a pony with a laundry cutie mark.

They hadn’t fared much better against disorganized resistance.

“Shining Armor would be ashamed,” Twilight muttered, as she walked through the front doors. She could see two soldiers wrestling, and two other soldiers in the bushes doing something that she also thought was wrestling at first but quickly realized it wasn’t and looked away, her cheeks burning.

“I hope he’s okay,” she said, more quietly, trotting quickly away from the groaning ponies, following an ache in her horn.

Midnight fed Spike another ruby.

"You're sure she's okay?" Spike asked.

Midnight nodded. "Yeah. We had to split up, but she's almost got as much experience in dungeoneering as I do. It's probably just taking her longer to get here because she's busy trying to draw an accurate map. Did I ever tell you that story?"

Spike shook his head.

"Shining Armor was running a game for her, me, and Cadance, and a big part of the adventure was this maze." Midnight's horn lit up, a simple illusion spell drawing lines in the air so Spike would have some pictures to look at. "Twilight was sure there were secret doors and rooms, and she didn't want to miss any treasure, so she started drawing a map. I figured it would be good so we wouldn't get lost."

"I like treasure," Spike said.

Midnight patted his head. "We all like treasure. Now, Shiny isn't using a grid map because he wants it to be more like a maze, and that means we shouldn't see it at all times. The problem is, he misses it when we make a turn and starts describing the wrong part of the maze."

"Uh-oh," Spike mumbled, sucking on the gemstone.

"We wandered around for hours because Twilight was sure there was a hidden room because her measurements didn't add up. She got so frustrated when she found out what happened that she filed a formal complaint with his superior officer!"

Spike giggled.

"He didn't really get in trouble but they made him retake cartography and orienteering."

"My map was perfect," Twilight declared, as she opened the door.

"Scrying sensor?" Midnight asked.

"No, I just listened at the door. I didn't want to walk into a trap." She stepped in and hugged Spike. "Thanks for taking care of him."

"I was worried about you," Spike mumbled.

"I knew you'd show up here sooner or later," Midnight said. "I wasn't gonna wait in the throne room."

"Have you seen anypony else?"

"Just the staff," Midnight shivered. "The maids are painting murals on the walls. Most of them are abstract, but some look an awful lot like Discord turning six ponies into stone."

"Let me guess, six very familiar ponies."

"It's a pretty good likeness, except for Nightmare Moon. She's really short for some reason."

Twilight let Spike go. "I need you to stay here until we fix this, okay? I know it's scary but it'll be over soon."

Spike nodded.

"There you are!" hissed one of the empty suits of armor lined up near the throne room.

Twilight and Midnight stopped, horns glowing.

The visor raised. Cadance looked out at them.

"...Why are you...?" Twilight started.

"I needed somewhere to hide where I could see ponies coming and going," she explained. "It's actually pretty comfortable."

"Have you seen Sunset or Princess Celestia?" Midnight moved closer so they could whisper.

"Or Nightmare Moon," Twilight added.

"You two are the first I've seen," Cadance said. "I was starting to think I was going to have to--"

"HEAR YE, HEAR YE!" A pony stepped out of the throne room. "The Emperor of Chaos, Lord of Entropy, Master of the Air Guitar, Three-Time World Heavyweight Chapeeeeen DISCORD humbly requests all ponies bearing Elements of Harmony entre vous por favor."

Twilight, Cadance, and Midnight shared a look.

The crier sighed. "That means you three jerks."

"Can you help me out of the armor?" Cadance whispered. "I'm stuck."

“Wonderful.”

Discord lounged in the throne, looking down at the three ponies in front of him.

“The three least-qualified ponies,” he mumbled after hearing the narration. “The Twins and the Princess of Hugs.”

“Hey!” Twilight and Midnight said, at the same time.

Discord shrugged and snapped his fingers. A book appeared in the air in front of them, flipping open to an image of Discord sitting on the throne and looking bored along with a long list of statistics.

“I’m just way outside the appropriate CR for your level,” Discord explained. “Why just look at that THAC0! You’d be better off trying to wrestle a dragon or two.”

The book slammed shut and vanished.

“Where is everypony else?” Discord asked. “I had a strict guest list, you know.”

A door burst open, and Sunset stomped into the room.

“I had a feeling the Element of Surprise wasn’t going to show up as an eleventh-hour addition to the six we already have,” she said. “I’ve been trying to find my way out of the castle wine cellars for an hour!”

“I hope you picked up a nice bottle or two while you were there.” Discord chuckled. “I don’t think you’d be quite so sour if you had a few glasses.”

Sunset stormed toward him. He motioned with his talon, and someone tapped Sunset on the shoulder.

“I’m going to need these back,” Discord said, from where he was also standing behind her. He plucked the mismatched wings from her back. “They were only on loan, after all.”

The second Discord vanished along with the wings he’d given her.

“So where are my two favorite horses?” Discord asked. “Don’t tell me they started fighting without me!”

“I was slightly delayed,” Celestia said, her voice echoing in the throne room several seconds before she teleported in. A three-tiered cake floated at her side. “You did ask me to bring dessert, after all.”

“This is why you’re one of my favorite ponies!” Discord laughed. “You have excellent manners.”

“How did she do the voice thing?” Cadance whispered.

“She always uses a scrying sensor to check before she pops in,” Sunset hissed back. “She says it’s for safety but really it’s because she likes to make a big showy entrance. It’s easy to throw your voice through the sensor, and since she’s been watching, she gets to look like she’s all-knowing and all-seeing.”

“You really take the magic out of sorcery when you explain it away like that,” Discord sighed. “Unless I miss my guess little Luna shouldn’t be far behind. She always was a fan of the dramatic entrance and--”

The floor of the throne room exploded, Nightmare Moon tearing through the marble.

“I have come to end your reign and--”

Nightmare Moon frowned and looked around.

“Am I truly the last one here?”

Celestia and Sunset both shrugged, the gestures almost mirror images.

Nightmare Moon swore in a language that had died centuries ago. Celestia gasped, ears burning red.

Discord yawned and waved a talon, the broken floor turning to pudding and flowing back into place before becoming stone again, the tiles in random shapes and sizes instead of the neat rows they’d been before.

“Now, let me explain your plan,” Discord said. “Because I know it better than you do.”

“I’d be very curious to hear your interpretation,” Celestia said, with what seemed like a genuine smile.

“You’re going to try to get in formation and fire about 1.21 jiggahugs of harmony at me, either turning me to stone or banishing me to chaos or whatever they feel like doing at the time. I admit I was really worried about your plan. But then, wouldn’t you know it, everything came together!”

“Came together for us, you mean,” Nightmare Moon said. “Perhaps you should begin begging for mercy?”

“No wonder Laughter woke up for you, Luna,” Discord retorted, with a grin. “That was an excellent joke. Timing needs work, and you were cuter when you weren’t in this goth phase, but, the judges seem impressed.” He motioned to the left, where three more Discords were holding up a 9, and 8.3, and a picture of a peanut.

“Keep smiling, then,” Nightmare Moon said. “Strike a pose if you want. Ponies will be looking at you in the statue garden for the next few centuries.”

“The thing is, dear old Tia always had prophetic dreams.”

“I know,” Nightmare Moon frowned. “I know better than you do about them.”

“And you know what she dreamed up in that delightful little recollection we shared? She saw that one of her friends would betray her!” Discord grinned. “And I won’t be going back to the statue garden. She already knows I’m going to stay free, and the best thing about prophecy is that it’s going to come true!”

“You told him?” Nightmare Moon turned to Celestia.

“I’m sorry,” Celestia whispered.

“Wonderful,” Nightmare Moon muttered. “So what is it, you're going to try and send me back to the moon?”

“That’s the best part!” Discord crowed. “It could be any of you! One of you ponies is going to be getting a face full of rainbows and it's not me!”

“You know, Discord, I’ve been thinking a lot about that dream myself,” Celestia said. “A few years ago, I would have stopped and spent days agonizing over what it meant, how to prepare for any betrayal, how to mitigate my losses…”

“And you learned to just wing it?” Discord guessed.

“No. I learned from my dearest Sunset that you can’t just sit on your flank and wait for things to come to you. You have to get ahead of the game and make the first move. I'll just use the Elements on myself after we deal with you.”

Discord paused in the middle of coming up with a pun, one talon in the air and his expression shifting from amusement to disbelief.

“You can’t be serious! You can’t just volunteer! That totally defeats any kind of dramatic tension! Besides, I’m going to stay free when this is over!”

“Girls, if you would?” Celestia asked. Nightmare Moon ushered the others into ranks, the shorter ponies in front of the two sisters.

Their Elements gleamed, starting to glow from within.

“If you’re going to be difficult, then I’ll just send you all right back to Tartarus until you appreciate fondue waterfalls and pretzel fish!” He grabbed at the air and pulled down, unzipping a portal. On the other side, the gloomy mountain peaks that Twilight and Midnight had escaped not long ago.

“For what it’s worth, Discord, I’m sorry,” Celestia said. “You really were my friend.”

Discord grabbed at the air, and space distorted around the ponies. Frustratingly, they refused to be drawn into the portal he’d ripped open. The light from the Elements grew stronger, the distortion being brute-forced back into something vaguely Euclidean, or at least as close as Equestria usually was.

A blue fireball crashed against a light swirling in all the colors of the rainbow starting to shine sourcelessly around the six ponies. It was swiftly followed by a giant golden chair, which bounced away like a rubber ball hitting an aura of pure harmony magic (it’s a very specific type of bounce).

“This isn’t fair!” Discord yelled.

“Well, you know what they say,” Sunset yelled. “Fairness isn’t magic!”

A tidal wave of rainbow-colored magic washed over Discord. The mismatched tyrant screamed as the magic of Harmony violently beat peace and friendship into him like a thousand ponies with clubs yelling at him to stop resisting.

“Sunset,” Celestia said. “No one has ever said that.”

“I know, but it felt like we needed some kind of snappy line.”

“You should workshop that one a little more,” Midnight suggested.

“I just assumed you had lines ready. For when you’re hunting monsters.” Cadance added. “You’ve probably had to say something clever dozens or hundreds of times.”

“No, most of the time I’m the only living pony for miles around,” Sunset said. “I don’t have anypony to be clever at. It’s usually more of a primal scream type of situation.”

“Oh, I heard that’s very good for relieving stress,” Cadance said, nodding with approval.

“Shouldn’t we be making sure Discord isn’t about to turn us into ice sculptures?” Twilight muttered. “In case you haven’t noticed there isn’t a fancy new statue decorating the castle.”

“Words of wisdom,” Nightmare Moon said. She craned her neck, looking around the throne room.

“He could be almost anything,” Midnight whispered. “Look for anything out of place.”

“What about that?" Someone asked.

The assembled ponies spun around to look.

"Who's got two thumbs and can't get caught by the same trick twice?" Discord asked.

Chapter 30

“This guy!” Discord said, two foam hands appearing on his talons just so he could point them at himself and his tasteful yet subtly exciting Team Discord T-shirt. “...Don’t give me that look, it’s a direct continuation from the last chapter.”

“How could he dodge it?” Sunset demanded. “I thought this was some kind of magical superweapon!”

“He shouldn’t have been able to,” Nightmare Moon growled.

“There’s a saying we have in the ephemerial chaos,” Discord said, lightly brushing his shoulder. “Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice… fool me once, won’t fool me again.”

Nightmare Moon looked at her sister. “Perhaps Celestia can talk him to death.”

“Oh, I know!” Discord clapped. “Everypony can try using their own special talent to defeat me, and then in the end we can talk about the lessons we learned and wrap it all up in a cute little letter with a moral at the end!”

“It seems he’s already familiar with your methods, sister.”

“I don’t always do that,” Celestia protested.

“You do it a lot,” Twilight mumbled.

“I’ve got a better idea,” Sunset said. Her horn lit up, and she stepped closer to Discord.

“Ooh. Are you going to blast me with a fireball? Some kind of exotic spell with big scientific words like ‘sublimation’? Hit me with your best shot.” He closed his eyes and tapped his chin.

Sunset grabbed his beard and pulled him down, slamming their foreheads together.

“Ow,” Cadance winced.

“Why would you--” Discord stumbled back. “That hurt! Celestia never hit me! She tried to disintegrate me, but she never got physical!”

“He didn’t dodge that?” Midnight frowned.

“You could have broken my other fang! I’ve only got the one good one, you know!”

“Grab him!” Twilight yelled.

Sunset lunged, snagging the end of his tail as he started to slip away. Discord snapped his talons, and only managed to get as far as his tail would reach.

“What?” Discord blinked.

“It’s the Element! It’s interfering with his magic!” Twilight yelled.

Cadance jumped in to pin his talon before he could snap again.

“Stop it!” Discord growled, trying to throw her off.

“Not strong enough to get rid of the Princess of Hugs?” Cadance asked. “I bet that nickname isn’t as funny now, is it?”

“I’m starting to get a little upset!” Discord growled. “That’s it, I’m going to send all of you somewhere that makes Tartarus look like a vacation destination! I hope you like New Jersey!”

Nightmare Moon’s hoof impacted where his liver would be if he was a pony. Discord spat out a stream of balloon animals. That probably meant it had been effective, and possibly also that he had a gallbladder filled with party supplies.

“Hit him with the Elements while he’s distracted!” She ordered.

“He’ll just dodge!” Midnight yelled.

“Not if I keep holding on!” Sunset squeezed.

Discord yelped, spitting out one last balloon dog.

“I’ll be fine! Just aim at the dumb noodle instead of me!”

“Don’t be stupid, Sunset! I’m stronger than you!” Cadance pulled, dragging Discord closer to her.

“This isn’t the time to argue!” Sunset pulled back, Discord starting to stretch and pop. “I can hold him! He’s got practically no upper-body strength!”

“Both of you let go!” Discord demanded. “This is absurd! I’m all-powerful!”

“Your FACE is all-powerful!” Sunset yelled.

Cadance struggled to hold on while Discord flailed. “Is that even an insult?”

“Take the shot!”

“Don’t take the shot! She’ll be a statue too!” Discord yelled.

“You can just unpetrify me later!”

Cadance bit her lip. “Are you so sure about that?”

“This was a lot more fun when things were going like I planned!” Discord wrenched, and the talon Cadance was holding popped off his body cleanly, feather stuffing showing in the hole like he was just a plush toy. His tail started to pop like a seam stretching.

“What's wrong, you can't handle a little unpredictable chaos?!" Sunset crawled up his body, scrambling up to get him around the shoulder and neck.

“Don't you dare threaten me with a good time!” Discord wiggled. "Let go!"

He snapped his talons and they turned upside-down.

“You think little tricks are gonna work when I had to deal with Midnight as a foal? She used to reverse gravity every time she slept!” Sunset squeezed tighter. “What’s wrong with all of you?! Stop watching on the sidelines and take the shot!”

The world dissolved into prismatic brilliance.

The Elements of Harmony are extremely powerful, arguably sentient, and ultimately almost impossible to actually control. The only thing that can be said for sure is that they channel the magic of Harmony, and every use has been effective, even on extraordinarily powerful targets.

When the rainbow light faded, Sunset expected to either be a statue or to be holding onto one, depending on how well the stupid things actually distinguished targets from collateral damage. Given their ability to seek out a target, she wasn't terribly hopeful.

Instead, she was holding something tiny and squirming, and from the feeling along her spine she'd popped a disk in her back from holding onto a wiggling chaos spirit.

“How dare you!” Discord squeaked. “I am chaos! I am death!”

Sunset was holding up what could be mistaken (at a distance, in poor lighting, by someone who had never actually seen one before) for a very large kitten. He bit Sunset's fetlock like an annoyed pet, making Sunset drop him on instinct. Celestia swept him up in a golden aura before he could get away on his four mismatched paws.

“What are we gonna do with the Emperor of Chaos and Master of a Hundred Stupid Titles?” Sunset asked, nodding at Discord and rubbing her fetlock. “Just because he’s small doesn’t mean he’s safe.”

“He’s the same size as Spike,” Twilight said. “Wait a minute...”

“Spike’s a baby dragon, does that mean…” Midnight continued.

Twilight and Midnight looked at each other.

“He’s a baby, um...” they said together, then stumbled, as had every taxonomist who had ever tried to classify Discord as anything other than a particularly poorly-made statue.

“Draconequuis,” Celestia provided. “But yes, he’s a baby again. This is how he looked back when he and I first met.”

"Sister always liked horrible monsters as pets, as long as they vaguely resembled cats," Nightmare Moon groaned.

“You were shorter,” Discord mumbled.

“I was!” Celestia agreed cheerfully.

“He’s adorable!” Cadance gasped. “We should keep him!”

“You should throw him in the dungeon,” Nightmare Moon said.

“But he’s so cute!” Celestia argued,

“I’m not cute,” Discord mumbled, hanging limply.

“He’s cute,” Cadance whispered, into Sunset’s ear.

Sunset looked at her and glared. “Thank you for your expert opinion.”

“By the time he’s out of the dungeon, he’ll be taller and less cute,” Nightmare Moon said, snatching her from Celestia’s grip.

“Luna, we can’t just throw him in prison! He’s a child!”

Nightmare Moon looked over her shoulder. “Maybe you’re right.”

“I’m glad you see things my way.”

“A dog crate is more appropriate for something his size.”

“Luna!”

Cadance giggled and hugged Sunset. After a moment she frowned, feeling something strange, and looked at Sunset’s back. She leaned in and nipped.

“Ow! Stop it!”

“You have feathers!” Cadance gasped.

“What?” Sunset jumped to her feet, ignoring her aching back.

“Hold on, I just have to-” Cadance tugged, unfolding something that hadn’t been there before.

Sunset looked over her shoulder, her eyes full of wonder and-- her expression went flat. “You’re joking.”

Cadance had revealed a wing that was about the same size and shape appropriate for a chicken.

“They’re the tiniest wings I’ve ever seen,” Twilight whispered.

Midnight groaned. “She’s gonna start yelling.”

“What the flipping buck is this?!” Sunset flapped it and looked exactly as absurd as one would assume. Discord snickered. Nightmare Moon snorted. Celestia had the composure to only laugh on the inside.

“I told you she was gonna yell,” Midnight mumbled.

“I think I can explain,” Celestia said, clearly trying to avoid laughing. “I explained things to Cadance as best I knew, though I don’t think she quite understood.”

“It’s some kind of ironic punishment, right?” Sunset demanded. "I wanted to be an alicorn and Discord was tempting me with it, so I have to learn some stupid lesson about forgiveness and maybe another lesson about surgical amputations."

Celestia cleared her throat. “Alicorns are created when a pony with a very high magical potential is exposed to an extreme magical gradient while doing something related to their cutie mark. Or possibly their destiny. Either way, the Elements of Harmony tend to qualify."

“The Elements are certainly more than enough,” Nightmare Moon said. “Celestia and I each wielded three of them the first time we fought this monster--”

“This adorable monster!” Celestia corrected, pinching Discord's cheek.

Nightmare Moon rolled her eyes. “The point is, it wasn’t intended for a pony to use more than one at a time. Probably. There was a considerable amount of backlash.”

“Age spells are considerably more complicated than petrification and used up more of the available magical output,” Celestia noted. “There was a lot less, ah, backlash as well, since we had the proper number of ponies. Since the amount of overflow that hit you was small, your, ah, attributes are… also small. It likely wouldn’t have done anything at all if you hadn’t been skirting the edge for years.”

“Skirting the edge?” Cadance asked.

“Between either having this happening or having her magic collapse entirely,” Celestia explained. “She severely damaged her leylines doing something foolish. Over the years, she got a little taller, a little stronger, and had repeated attacks because of her damaged wellspring. It was like a cake left half-baked. If you wait too long, trying to fix it leaves it half burned and half raw.”

“That’s a terrible metaphor,” Nightmare Moon sighed.

“Do you have a better one?”

“...No,” Nightmare Moon admitted.

“The good thing is, you’ll have plenty of time to come up with one,” Celestia said.

“I’m sure that you all have many questions,” Celestia said, once the press had been gathered, the sun and moon set back in their proper places, and the Royal Guard had recovered and restored order.

They'd decided to let Celestia handle the talking purely on the merit that the press would bend over backwards to put a positive spin on what she said.

“Equestria has been through an almost unprecedented period of chaos and uncertainty, but I assure you that the threat is over, and you are all safe once again. I wish that I could take credit for this, but in truth, my part in this was the smallest amongst today’s heroes.”

Celestia motioned with her wing to the ponies at her side.

“I would like to formally introduce my sister, Princess Luna.”

Nightmare Moon frowned at that but didn’t correct Celestia.

“My sister has been long absent from the throne because of misunderstandings between us, but when Equestria needed her most, she returned and personally led my students, both current and former, to success alongside Princess Cadance. She saved me, and all of you, and has my deepest thanks.”

“What exactly happened?” Yelled a reporter from the Canterlot Daily.

“There was a massive surge of chaos magic,” Celestia explained. “I was unfortunately caught in the initial manifestation. I assure you that there was no real danger to life and limb. Next question.”

“Where’s your throne?”

Celestia looked through the window. The huge golden seat was just visible on the lawn.

“Next good question?” She suggested.

“Amazing,” Nightmare Moon said, walking alongside Celestia as they left the throne room. “You spoke for almost an hour, answered every question, and you managed to avoid actually telling anything even remotely related to the truth. You do truly have a talent for politics, sister. Perhaps in other circumstances, you would have a tax form on your flank instead of the sun.”

“It’s distasteful but necessary,” Celestia said. “I can’t always protect them from a dangerous world, but I can try to shield them from the harsh truths.”

“So instead of being banished, I was merely away in the very vaguest of terms. And instead of Discord being a deadly threat, it was merely a magical accident with no villain.”

“It’s easier this way. I want our ponies to see you as a hero, and Discord… I meant it when I said he was my friend. Maybe with how Equestria is now, we can be friends again.”

“Remember that easy isn’t always the best option,” Nightmare Moon cautioned. “You’ve always had a bad habit of taking the easy path just to avoid conflict now, even when it hurts ponies later. Your students. Me.”

“You’re right,” Celestia admitted. “I was already planning on having a chat with them.”

“Stop planning it and do it,” Nightmare Moon ordered. “You owe me. I’ll consider your debt lessened if you’ll mare up and do something hard for once in your life.”

There was a slow knock on the door.

“It’s open unless you’re the press,” Sunset yelled. She tossed the vest she was wearing aside and tried on a white cape with gold trim. It almost immediately slid over to one side, making it completely useless for what she wanted.

Celestia took a cape to the face when she opened the door.

“Outfit problems?” She asked, trying to dislodge it from her horn. She tugged a few times before it came free.

“I need to cover these stupid things,” Sunset muttered. Her tiny wings... well, flapped is far too elegant a term for limbs that could only flail like a barnyard fowl's.

“You’ll grow into them,” Celestia assured her.

Sunset frowned. “Unless I grow backwards that doesn’t seem likely.”

“I mean they’ll get bigger, eventually.” Celestia sighed. “It’s just going to take a few years.”

“And I’ll be a laughingstock until then.”

“I think anypony who laughs at you deserves what they’ll get,” Celestia said. “I thought Cadance would be here.”

“She’s trying to find something that won’t make me look fat or stupid.”

“You realize she’s going to come back with something…” Celestia trailed off.

“I know. Something even worse. Probably with lace.”

“What about a jacket?” Celestia asked, taking a rather plain black coat from the closet. “It won’t slide around like a cape thanks to the sleeves, and it’s thick enough to cover your sides.”

Sunset pulled it on.

“Hmm…” She turned to the side. “I think I can make this work.”

Celestia glanced towards the next room. “Could you get Midnight? I think I owe her an explanation.”

Midnight glared at the huge white liar.

“So he was telling the truth. You knew all along.”

Celestia nodded wordlessly.

“Why wouldn’t you tell me?”

“At the time, it seemed like the thing to do,” Celestia said. “I thought it would be a few moons at most, and you’d be going home, and Sunset would have learned a valuable lesson. She’d be learning about the mirror, ending her obsession, and doing it for somepony else instead of her own ambition.”

“Where is my home?” Midnight whispered.

“The mirror was created by Star Swirl the Bearded. It’s a portal, which opens from time to time to another world. He never taught me the secrets of making them, and despite all my efforts I couldn’t repair it.”

“So you just never told me?!”

“It was easier. You were happy. You didn’t remember anything of that horrible place. I’ve seen the other world. It’s cruel and terrible in ways you can’t imagine. No magic or harmony, just random chance. When I saw it, the natives had barely mastered the written word and buildings were made of animal skins stretched over wooden frames. Ponies were enslaved and, as far as I could tell, little more than animals.”

Midnight looked down at her hooves.

“For a year I did everything in my power to fix the mirror. Then your birthday came around and I wavered in my resolve. I saw how you and Sunset were. Sunset is like a daughter to me, and I was losing her. When you appeared, at first you were a project to keep her attention. I thought it would just be a way to curb her growing ambition.”

“So if Sunset hadn’t taken me in, you’d have let me go?”

“Even if I could send you back, how could I justify sending a foal into a place so bad Star Swirl used it as a prison? By keeping you close at hoof I could at least make sure you were happy. And you were. And, I hope, you’ll be happy again.”

“I want to see it.”

Spike clapped his hands while Discord used what tiny spark of chaos magic he still possessed to make the gems in his dinner change color.

“So the dragon is… your younger brother?” Nightmare Moon asked, slowly. “Your parents must have a very interesting lifestyle which I don’t wish to know anything about.”

“No, no, he’s adopted because I hatched him,” Twilight explained.

“You hatched him?” Nightmare Moon frowned. “Doesn’t that make you his mother?”

“By dragon law, sure. But officially he’s my brother because I was only a filly when he was born. Celestia said it would be easier if we were siblings since we were so close in age.”

“With all these interesting decisions my sister has made it makes me wonder if overthrowing her and plunging Equestria into eternal night wouldn’t be better for everypony.”

Spike burped loudly. Discord yelled something and his voice abruptly cut out.

“Oops,” he said. “I accidentally, uh…”

“I’ll get the bucket,” Twilight sighed.

“Where’s Discord?” Nightmare Moon asked, with some alarm.

Celestia pulled the tarp free.

The mirror looked the same as it did years ago, a crack running down the glass, the silver dulled. It reflected the sealed room dimly, more like a gently rippling puddle of mud than a real mirror.

“It opens once every thirty moons,” Celestia explained. “Or at least it used to. In its current state, if a pony tried to go through, they wouldn’t reach the other side.”

Midnight glared at her distorted reflection. “Discord said he could get me there.”

A curl of smoke flitted through the room to stop in front of Celestia, erupting into green flame and depositing a baby Draconequuis in mid-air. Celestia caught him just before he hit the ground.

“That dragon is a menace!” Discord squeaked. “He set me on fire!”

“You seem fine,” Celestia said. “You should be glad he just sent you like a letter instead of actually burning you to a cinder.”

“Yes, but I’m the only one allowed to be a menace!”

“As long as you’re here, perhaps you’d like to help?” She motioned to the mirror.

“Oh. That.” Discord frowned. He folded his paws. “You know I never planned on fixing it, right?”

Midnight huffed. “I should have known.”

“I was quite serious with my offer to send you home,” Discord said. “I just wasn’t going to do anything as droll as repairing anything. Chaos magic is terrible at that. If I tried to snap my talons and put it back together…” He snapped, and nothing happened. He tried a few more times until there was a spark. “...we’d only get seven years of bad luck.”

“Then what would you have done?” Celestia asked.

“Fixing things is impossible, so I would have torn a hole through the universe and tossed her through. It would have been hilarious! She’d have gone home but still been a pony while in a world of bipeds!”

“Could you do that?” Midnight looked up at Celestia.

Celestia shook her head.

“Hmmm…” Discord leaned in close to the mirror, scratching at it with his talon. “There’s still a little give in this, you know.”

“A little give?” Midnight asked.

“If you tried to go through, you’d turn into a plate of tragic purple spaghetti, but you could get something smaller through.”

Nightmare Moon read over the scroll that had appeared in front of her.

“Sister found Discord. Apparently, he didn’t burn to death. I suppose not everything can go as well as we hope.” She rolled it up and tossed it aside. “We should keep him on a leash.”

Twilight rocked Spike back and forth, lulling the dragon to sleep. “Is it true you’re leaving?”

“I believe it would be best. I don’t like the fawning nobility here worshipping my sister’s hooves.”

“I want to go with you,” Twilight said.

Nightmare Moon raised an eyebrow slowly. “Oh?”

“Well, um, you’re going to be at the Castle of the Twin Sisters, right? There are a ton of books there I’ve never even heard of before!”

“Ah, so it’s my library you’re after, is it?”

“There’s also…” Twilight looked down. “If I stay here, ponies are always going to compare me and Midnight.”

“They’ll do that no matter what.”

“Yeah, but if we’re together doing the same things all the time it’s like constantly being in a race! I mean I’m not afraid of losing and my grades are better--”

“But staying ahead is exhausting,” Nightmare Moon said. “I sympathize. I had to deal with my sister.”

“And I want to be your student. You can teach me things Celestia wouldn’t.”

“I won’t teach you things she would,” Nightmare Moon pointed out. “She’s a better teacher and has far more patience.”

“I’m a good enough student to make up for it. I don’t want the same education as Midnight. We’ll always be connected, but this whole thing with the Elements taught me that we don’t have to be the same to work together. Our differences make us stronger because we bring different things to the table.”

“You certainly are one of Sister’s students. She loves summarizing things in pithy little lessons like that.”

“Will you let me be your student?”

“It would be an unnecessary burden. What would I get out of it?” Nightmare Moon examined her hoof with apparent disinterest.

“How about a head of staff?”

“I can’t convince you to stay?” Celestia asked.

“We’re on the parade grounds,” Nightmare Moon said, her voice flat. “I’ve already packed a luggage train with everything I’ll need in the immediate future. The Night Guard is assembled to go with me. My sencheal spent a week planning this with your help. And now you ask if you can convince me?”

“She’s got a point,” Sunset said, tugging on the leash she was holding. A tiny chaos spirit was on the other end, struggling with the collar. Cadance was busily tying a pink ribbon to his horn.

“This is humiliating,” Discord mumbled.

Midnight yawned. “Did we really have to do this in the middle of the night?”

“The Night Guard couldn’t provide an escort during the day,” Cadance said. “You have to admit their armor looks nice, though.”

Celestia looked around. “I suppose it is a bit silly to ask. Is it too much to hope we can at least stay in touch?”

Nightmare Moon sighed. “I won’t be on the moon. Our castles are close enough that we could see each other if we wave.”

“Oh good,” Celestia smiled. “That means you won’t mind joining me for dinner on occasion?”

Nightmare Moon cleared her throat, and Twilight trotted up with a scroll.

“Full moons at the Castle of the Twin Sisters, new moons at Canterlot,” Twilight said. “Holidays are negotiable, but the Summer Sun Celebration and Nightmare Night events will obviously be coordinated by the respective party.”

She gave Celestia the scroll to read.

“I see you have a calendar and suggestions,” Celestia laughed a little.

Cadance read over her shoulder. “I’d better still be in charge of Hearts and Hooves Day.”

“The schedule will be tight for the first full moon depending on how long it takes to have the castle renovated,” Twilight said. “I’ve already sent letters to the nearby towns of Hollow Shades and Ponyville, and they’ll be sending ponies to assist with the repairs.”

“Don’t be afraid to ask for help,” Celestia said, leaning in to hug Nightmare Moon. “I know you don’t need it, Luna, but it would be a favor to me if you allowed me to help you with some little thing once in a while.”

“I’ll consider it,” Nightmare Moon said. “As a favor to you.”

“Hey, Twilight,” Midnight said, quietly. “You’re not just leaving because of me, are you?”

Twilight shook her head. “Don’t be so self-centered. I’m doing this because it’s a great opportunity.”

Midnight narrowed her eyes. “You have a crush on her, don’t you?”

“What?! Your mind is warped by being too close to Cadance all the time! I respect Nightmare Moon and she saved everypony but that doesn’t mean I like her in that way! Ponies can respect each other and be friends without there being romantic feelings involved!”

“Mmm…” Midnight smiled.

“I always shipped her with you, Midnight,” Cadance said, loudly enough that there was absolutely no way everypony on the parade ground didn’t hear.

Midnight and Twilight both looked at her.

“You wanna trade places?” Midnight asked.

“Not on your life,” Twilight snorted.

“We’re leaving,” Nightmare Moon called out. “Twilight, with me.”

Twilight waved and bounded off to the waiting chariot. The Night Guard took to the sky, Nightmare Moon and Twilight at their center, a dark arrow pointing right to the center of the Everfree and the uncertain future.

Discord sighed, sitting on the cobblestones and picking his nose. “This would be a good time for some kind of pithy quote.”

“Yes,” Celestia said. “It would.”

“Maybe an ominous sign of things to come?” Discord suggested. “Sequel bait type of thing?”

“What are you even talking about?” Sunset sighed.

“Never mind,” Discord sighed. “Let’s just get to the epilogue.”

Prologue

Celestia wouldn’t talk to her about what she’d seen in the mirror.

What she was seeing.

A copy of herself, looking back at her, but with wings fluttering at her sides and a crown resting lightly on her head. It was was she wanted and deserved.

Sunset Shimmer sat in front of the mirror, staring at her own reflection. She’d been doing this almost every night despite Celestia’s direct orders against it. The room was sealed, with guards at the door and teleport wards keeping anypony out.

Or at least that was the theory - it had taken Sunset less than a day of study to decide that the castle's wards were the weakest link, and another week to crack them without setting off any alarms, something assassins and spies had been trying to do for decades. If money had mattered to her, she could have sold the secrets for enough to make her a very wealthy mare.

That had been months ago, and she hadn’t gotten anywhere since that. Years of work, and right at the end she was being held back by the pony who should have been helping her get through the last barrier.

“Then again, she has Cadance for that now. She doesn’t even need me.” Sunset grumbled, seething as she pictured the pink princess. Everything was going wrong. She stood up to pace. “If she hadn’t come along, I’d probably be a princess already!”

She turned to look at herself in the mirror. It didn't share her frustration. It sat serene and placid, watching her with an unreadable, detached expression. The same expression Celestia always had, that mask that said she was hiding some amusing secret that she wasn’t going to tell anypony. She picked up one of the books she’d brought and just barely stopped herself from throwing it at the mirror. Her reflection looked disappointed at her temper tantrum.

“No… too much noise and they’ll hear me,” she muttered. The doors weren’t entirely soundproofed, and if she caused a commotion she’d have to deal with explaining herself to a few stallions that already didn’t like her.

Sunset had a better plan today. She put the book back down, a spellbook she’d managed to sneak out of the restricted section of the library. Nothing had quite pointed to what she wanted, but this was at least a lead.

“Hopefully this time Star Swirl actually got something right that didn’t involve ceramics or facial hair,” she said to herself, going through the pages. They were written in backwards Horse Latin, which would be easy to translate if his hoofwriting didn’t look like he’d copied the spell’s instructions down while blindfolded, upside-down, with his head in a bucket of water.

Still, it was definitely something related to the enchantments on the mirror, and she’d translated enough to make an attempt at casting it.

“If I use this on the mirror, I should at least get some kind of a clue.” She braced herself, and cast the spell, forming the runes in her mind and closing her eyes to help her focus.

Vice-Principal Luna paced in front of the school statue, her mood souring. She wasn't sure what she liked less - it was a real toss-up between being forced to babysit when she had actual work to do, and the fact that her sister thought that looking after a child was an appropriate use of her time at all.

She should have been working on moving funding back to the after-school programs that her sister had been neglecting, but no, making sure a toddler was kept busy was obviously as much as she could handle.

"I'm not a toddler," the girl said, quietly. Luna looked down at her. The young girl flinched under the attention, bumping her head on the base of the marble horse. "I-I'm six. That's outside of the standard use-"

"It's impolite to correct your elders," Luna snapped, annoyed, partly at the child and partly at her own bad habit of talking to herself.

"Sorry. You were talking and I thought you were talking to me and..." she shrank down. "Sorry."

Luna took a deep breath. She was a little too good at her job of keeping the unruly students of Canterlot High in line, sometimes. Being the disciplinarian her sister failed to be meant that she sometimes wasn't aware of how intimidating she was.

"It's fine," Luna said. "Hopefully this won't be for nothing. Spending hours to try and convince a single student to attend the school is foolish."

"I liked Crystal Prep better," The girl said. She winced at Luna's expression. "I-I mean, I was doing research since I'll have to decide someday and they have all the awards and-"

Luna snorted and waved a hand. "All because my sister can't be bothered to follow their example and start winning. Instead she'd rather hand out participation awards and pat people on the back for trying their best."

The girl watched as the vice-principal paced.

"Can I assume you are able to amuse yourself for a few minutes?" Luna asked. Maybe she could at least get a few emails done while her sister played at being a salesman.

"That's why I brought my books," the girl said, holding the one she was reading up so Luna could see the title. "I'm almost done with Daring Do and the Secret Reptoid Masters! Mom said if I'm good, we'll go to the bookstore later and I can get the next book in the series."

"Fine," Luna said. "I'll be back in a few minutes. Don't go anywhere, don't talk to strangers. Just... stay right there."

Luna stalked off to her office, assuming there was no way the girl could manage to get into trouble in just a few minutes. One would think that having been a teacher in a high school she'd be aware that children could get into near-infinite trouble in mere moments.

The girl settled into reading her book, leaning back on the cool stone. For a few minutes, everything was fine, but just as she was really getting into the story, reading about Daring Do revealing shapeshifting reptilians on live television, she felt the marble behind her suddenly vanish, and she was falling backwards.

The world dissolved into a chaotic mess of lights and sounds. There was a sense of straining, like even her small body was too big to fit in the universe. Cracks spread through space. A sound like breaking glass and tearing metal echoed across the cosmos.

There was a sensation like a round peg being forced through a square hole, but the holes were in extra dimensions and the parts being sheared off included something very important that she was already starting to forget, like the fading details of a dream.

“Something’s happening!” Sunset leaned closer to the mirror. This was it! This was going to show her the secret to reach the next level! Her reflection had disappeared, and the surface of the mirror had started to ripple like a stone dropped into water.

There was a shape forming in the distorted reflection. Sunset narrowed her eyes, trying to make it out. It looked small, it seemed to be moving, and it was-

“Purple?” Sunset asked, just before something smacked into her head hard enough to send her to the floor in a heap, stars dancing as her vision faded to black.

Something prodded Sunset’s chest. Her head was pounding, and she could feel a bruise forming already.

“Please wake up…” The voice sounded terrified, not just at the edge of tears but beyond it and crying openly.

“Mmmrphm.” Sunset said. It made more sense in her mind, before the concussion and semi-consciousness reduced it to a noise instead of a word. She opened her eyes, blinking slowly to try and clear her vision. Everything was sort of wobbly and detached. Probably because of the massive, pounding headache.

“What’s going on?” Asked a tiny, terrified voice. Sunset looked at the source of the noise. A filly. Couldn’t have been more than six or so. Very purple. Just like the thing she’d seen in-

“The mirror!” Sunset gasped, stumbling to her feet to look. What she saw made her eyes go wide. The glass had gone cloudy, and a crack had formed across it. She could still dimly feel the enchantment there, but it was very badly damaged.

“It’s not my fault!” The filly said, cowering.

“No, this is- I must have messed up the spell.” Sunset slumped, sitting down in defeat. “It’s not like a filly like you could damage an artifact even if you tried.”

“A filly? I’m not a filly.” The filly looked up, frowning.

“You’re not a colt, and you’re a little young to be a mare,” Sunset snorted. “How did you even get here?”

“I don’t remember,” The filly whispered. “I was falling, and then… and then I woke up here, a-and I can’t remember anything before it. I-I don’t know what to do!” She started crying. Loudly. Sunset heard the doors start to open.

“Horseapples... “ Sunset whispered, looking back at the door.

“What’s going on in-” the first guard stopped speaking when he saw Sunset. “You’re not supposed to be in here! How did you get in?”

“She’s got a filly!” The second yelled.

“Sunset Shimmer, you’re under arrest for foalnapping!”

“I didn’t foalnap her!” Sunset yelled. “She just appeared!”

“That’s Shining Armor’s sister!”

“She foalnapped Shining Armor’s sister!”

Sunset looked at the filly. “Okay, great, now we know where you came from.” She picked her up with her magic. Tried to pick her up with her magic. Instead there was a sharp, stabbing pain in her sinuses and a shower of sparks as the spell failed. “...Crapbaskets.”

“Get her!” The guards yelled, piling into the room.

“Help!” The filly yelled, grabbing Sunset’s leg and tripping her, dashing any hope of escape.

“This is just not my day.” Sunset groaned, before the butt of a spear sent her sprawling to the ground.

Author's Note

And so it begins.

I decided to release this on Mother's Day for two very good reasons: First, because the story definitely has some themes about motherhood, and also because I needed a kick in the pants to get something going. At the time I write this, the earliest drafts of the story are from almost two years ago, and I've been sitting on them long enough.

Chapter 9

“What’s that?” Sunset asked, putting a half-melted sword in the umbrella stand near the door. It wasn’t even the only sword in there. The lone umbrella would have felt distinctly out of place among the cutlery, if it was able to feel. It was pink, so no points for guessing who had actually had the audacity to put something harmless in the room.

“You know that report Midnight and Twilight had to do?” Cadance asked. She levitated more popcorn into her mouth, crunching it as she talked and flipped through pages. “They wanted me to answer some questions for them.”

“They asked you?” Sunset stopped, somewhat offended.

“It’s about love, not evocation.”

Sunset felt a little better about that, for the two and a half seconds before she remembered she shouldn’t feel better about it.

“Wait, love? But she’s in kindergarten! She’s too young to have a coltfriend!” What Sunset really meant by that was ‘I didn’t have a coltfriend when I was her age’. It was about half jealousy and half offended by the decadence of the youths, something Sunset was allowed to be offended by now that she had a kid. Sort of.

“Don’t worry.” Cadance tried to contain a laugh and mostly failed. “She doesn’t have a special somepony yet.”

“Thank the stars for that,” Sunset muttered. “Last thing I want is her taking after you.”

“I’ll have you know I didn’t get a special somepony until I was twice Midnight’s age.”

“Twice her actual age, or twice her apparent age?” Sunset asked.

“She and Twilight gave me a big list of questions about something they read in Celestia’s personal diaries,” Cadance continued, ignoring Sunset’s question.

“Wait, even at twice her apparent age you’d still have only been about- wait, did you say Celestia’s personal diaries?” Sunset dropped what she was doing and ran over to look at the papers Cadance was flipping through.

“Apparently they weren’t sure about some of the phrases she used,” Cadance said. She held up a paper.

Sunset read over it, blushing harder and harder.

She managed to force out a question. “With the entire royal guard? At the same time?”

“Apparently! I don’t even know where you’d find a bathtub that large!”

“I think I need to lie down,” Sunset said. She was starting to feel faint.

“Ah, you need some time alone in your bunk with that image? I know how it goes. Do you need any hoof lotion?”

“Cadance!”

“But seriously, I felt that, as Midnight’s guardian, mentor, mother-figure, etcetera, you should help me figure out just what to tell her.”

Sunset was going to refuse on instinct, and almost did.

“I mean, if you want me to, I’ll just give her The Talk on my own…”

Sunset had a good imagination. This was not to her benefit as she pictured exactly what Cadance would say when teaching Midnight about the way two (or more, she amended, thinking about the implications of the entire royal guard) ponies could express their love.

“We’re not telling her about preening,” she blurted out.

Cadance rolled over, unable to contain her laughter.

“What does this have to do with our report?” Midnight asked.

“Strictly speaking, hopefully nothing,” Sunset said.

“We really don’t have time,” Twilight said. “We were trying to practice the oral presentation part of the report.”

“So far we’ve learned not to use words in an oral report that we’ve only read and never actually heard pronounced,” Midnight added.

“This is only gonna take a few minutes,” Sunset said. She paused. “Cadance why did you invite Twilight?”

“Well she needs to have The Talk too,” Cadance said, setting up a stand. As Sunset watched, the unicorn growing more and more concerned, Cadance pulled several cardstock posters out of a bag and flipped through them before putting them on the stand. "And her mom gave me permission."

“Cadance,” Sunset said. She was having all sorts of emotions, but the king of them all was Suspicion, ruling from an iron throne of Disappointment.

“Yes, Sunset?”

“Is that a professionally typeset and printed presentation?”

“I’m the Princess of Love, Sunset. It’s important for me to be prepared at all times.”

“You probably slipped all kinds of weird horseapples into this…” Sunset interposed herself between the two impressionable fillies and started going through the presentation.

“What’s going on?” Midnight whispered.

“Don’t look at me, this is obviously your fault!” Twilight countered.

“You hired a graphic designer?!” Sunset frowned harder. “And you have citations?!”

“There’s a guide to suggested further reading at the end,” Cadance pointed out.

“This is better than some of the reports I’ve given to Celestia.” Sunset sounded jealous. “She never let me hire a graphic designer.”

“Did you ever ask?”

“Well… no,” Sunset admitted.

“Excuse me!” Twilight had her hoof raised. “Whatever happened it wasn’t my fault!”

“This isn’t about anyone’s fault,” Cadance said. “There are some cracks and crevices involved but they’re not geological-”

Sunset elbowed her, hard, in the ribs.

“What I mean is, this is about the questions you asked. About Princess Celestia’s private journal.”

Midnight and Twilight sat up straighter at that.

“We had a lot of questions,” Twilight said. “I didn’t really understand a lot of what she wrote, but I think she and Princess Platinum were friends?”

“They were very special friends,” Cadance agreed.

“Like how you and Mom are friends?” Midnight asked.

Sunset sputtered, her cheeks turning red.

“No!” Sunset gasped, eventually. “Absolutely not!”

“Not yet,” Cadance whispered, winking. “Give me a few more months to work on it.”

Twilight and Midnight looked at each other, equally confused.

“Now, let’s start with part one,” Cadance said. “I call it ‘Shipping and Handling’. We’ll learn about the twenty-six axes of compatibility that need to be taken into account when choosing a special somepony.”

Twilight and Midnight bolted out of the room, screaming about cooties. Cadance watched them go, sighing deeply.

“I never even got halfway through explaining how lust and love are different.”

“The quesadilla pie chart was clever,” Sunset said. “But I think they’re gonna be traumatized by tortillas and cheese for the rest of their lives. I know I will be.”

“But I didn’t even start to explain the answers to their questions.”

Sunset sighed and shook her head. “Sometimes you don’t really want an answer to a question.”

Cadance swooned dramatically. “Of all the things I’d ever think you’d say…”

“Okay, first off, this has nothing to do with what’s between me and Princess Celestia. That’s mostly water under the bridge. Second, I still really, really want answers but I’m smart enough to know that freaking nothing I can do to get answers out of her.”

Cadance hesitated, not quite sure what to say.

“Third, after that mess even I’m starting to think cooties are real.”

“They are not real!” Cadance gasped. “How could you say that?”

“If you say so, Princess of Cooties.”

“Noooo!”

"...And that's why Hoofdini was the greatest magician who ever lived!" The filly concluded, excited. Her partner stood to the side, silent and bored. "Nopony could ever tell how much of his act was real magic, and how much was sleight of hoof and misdirection. Even the number of spells that he knew is widely debated to this day."

"Thank you, Miss Lulamoon," Ms. Wormwood said. "That was very... interesting. I am not entirely sure pyrotechnics were needed during the presentation."

"They were intended to increase my stage presence. As the great Hoofdini said, a magician might cast spells in private, but magic is only created when an audience is given to wonder and awe."

"I assume they were the magical portion of the assignment?" Ms. Wormwood asked.

"No, they were just for fun," the filly noted. "My real trick will require the help of my lovely assistant..." She trailed off, then coughed. "Faery Fire! That's you!"

"Me? Oh." The quiet filly next to the bombastic young Lulamoon stepped forward. "What am I supposed to do again?"

"Just stay right there, and I'll make you vanish!" The filly pulled a sheet seemingly out of nowhere, something that was clearly a bedsheet that had been crudely painted with stars and planets. "Behold, fellow kindergarteners, as I make this filly... disappear!"

She draped the sheet over her, waited a moment, then pulled it away, revealing the filly.

"...I'm still here," Faery Fire said.

"Yes, I can see that," her partner muttered. "Okay, I can do this. Watch as I make her..." She put the sheet back over Faery Fire, counted to three, then pulled it away. "Disappear!"

"Am I invisible?" Faery Fire asked.

"No, you are not," her partner muttered. "You are very highly visible, even though I ordered you to become transparent. Clearly there is something wrong with my assistant."

"I think you cast the spell wrong," Faery Fire whispered. "And was the 'clearly' part a pun?"

"How dare you!" Her partner gasped, flicking the bedsheet aside, where it vanished. "I never cast a spell wrong!"

"You made the sheet invisible instead of me," Faery Fire pointed to the filly's seemingly-empty hoof.

"...If I did, it was what I intended to do all along!" She stuck her nose up in the air and stormed away from the front of the class, stomping back to her seat and sitting down heavily.

"Well, that was certainly something," Ms. Wormwood whispered. "Faery Fire, you can go back to your seat." She paused as she looked at the next group on the list. "Next we have... Midnight Twinkle and Twilight Sparkle. Please come up to the front of the class."

Midnight looked at Twilight and walked up to the front of the class. Seeing the other students give their presentations had filled her with a vague sense of dread. She hadn't actually read over her copy of the report since she'd written it with Twilight, and neither of them had tried to cast the spell since that initial disaster.

"W-we did our presentation on Princess Platinum," Midnight started. "I'm sure everypony is already familiar with the name from the Hearth's Warming story, but there's a lot more to her than just a name from an old story."

Twilight bit her lip, letting Midnight continue.

"Princess Platinum was born to a minor noble family in Old Unicornia," Midnight continued. "She had two sisters, who were, um..." She looked down at her notes.

"Sterling and Gold Lily," Twilight provided.

"Right! But only one of them could inherit the lands of their family, and since Gold Lily was the oldest, she was supposed to get everything. Records aren't clear on what happened to Sterling, but at the time there was a push towards expanding the frontier, because, um... there was a food problem."

"Old Unicornia had very inefficient farming techniques," Twilight said, picking up where Midnight had stopped. "According to several accounts, the soil was so poor from mine waste and poor mineral content that they had to use what we would call hydroponics, though at the time they were extremely inefficient. The peasants had to subsist on a type of bread made from algae, while the nobility was able to afford more expensive, imported food. When the mines started to dry up, they pushed into new lands to try and stake new claims."

"Right, and that was the original reason Platinum came to Equestria. Her sister gave her a loan on the condition that she didn't return to Old Unicornia," Midnight said. "She used the money to found the expedition and come here."

"She didn't gain her title of Princess until much later," Twilight added. "Once she purchased the claim here in Equestria, she was given the title of Countess."

"And, um..." Midnight tried to remember what came next. She read ahead in the report.

"They said she was a fool for wasting her money on a newly discovered frozen land," Twilight said, taking over entirely now. "You all know the story of what happened at Hearth's Warming. However, most importantly, Platinum learned to cooperate with the earth ponies and pegasi that had also come from their native lands. By abandoning her old traditions, all of them were able to prosper together. She gained the title Princess only after the various small states and land claims formally unified, which took another two decades after the Hearth's Warming story, so really we should be calling her Countess Platinum in the play, but that doesn't flow as well as Princess Platinum, and-"

Midnight coughed.

"A-and that's not important," Twilight blushed. "She eventually gave up the throne to Princess Celestia, but retained her own title, even if it was largely ceremonial."

"And she had an army of golems!" Midnight put in.

"She... was well known for having a talent with animating objects," Twilight said. "The rumors of a golem army are unfounded. However, she got her cutie mark for combining magical animation and the principles of clockwork to create complicated automatons, many of which we still can't explain today. Hearth's Warming dolls are thought to be a remnant of a time when wealthy families would put Platinum's works on display during the holidays."

"Very good," Ms. Wormwood said. "And what kind of spell are you going to demonstrate for us? I trust it's nothing dangerous?"

"No, it's perfectly safe," Twilight said. She reached into her pack and brought out Smarty Pants.

"She'll be our beautiful assistant today," Midnight said, glancing back at the filly who was still sulking in her seat. "We're going to cast a spell to make the doll come to life!"

"Stand back," Twilight said. She could still mostly remember the spell. Not having actually cast it, she had to go entirely on memory for what was in the book. Her horn lit up and she closed her eyes, trying to picture it.

The magic slipped away from her, spilling out of the runes uselessly. Twilight's eyes went wide. She was forgetting something critical in the spell! She was going to fail, and the entire class would make fun of her.

"I got this," Midnight whispered. She started forming the same spell. Twilight could feel it on her horn - it had the same flaws and gaps, and the magic was leaking out of the edges.

"It's not gonna work!" Twilight hissed.

"You just have to give it more power!" Midnight said, gritting her teeth. The glow from her horn increased, and the spell shuddered to completion, the magic twisting the misshapen runes into place like a spark jumping a gap.

"Come on, come on..." Twilight chanted, looking at Smarty Pants.

The doll raised her arm before slowly sitting up.

"It lives!" Midnight cackled. Smarty Pants started slowly walking around before trotting over to Twilight and jumping up onto her back.

"And that's the come-to-life spell!" Midnight said. "Right now it's just set to follow around its master, but you can make the spell more complicated and add pre-set commands, kinda like teaching a pet new tricks."

"That's very impressive," Ms. Wormwood said. "I knew you two would do a good job if you worked together. You can return to your seats."

"We did it!" Twilight smiled, as they walked back to their desks.

"Of course we did. It's a good thing I didn't slack off and forget to practice the spell." Midnight smirked.

"You could have tried studying, too," Twilight frowned. "I did much more work than you did on this project."

"No way. The spell was way more important than the report."

"Nuh-uh! The report was more important!"

"No, the spell!"

"The report!"

Ms. Wormwood sighed and opened her desk drawer, looking at the green bottle within. It was going to be one of those days.

Chapter 19

Midnight twirled on her hooves, the music gently swirling around her. It had taken a long time to get over being clumsy, even with the dance lessons she'd been gifted. She'd never be the best in the class, but she'd definitely improved the most out of all the ponies who had attended.

Of course, saying she'd never be the best in the class assumed she wasn't going to cheat. A simple casting of Kitten's Grace and Peacock's Splendor before going on stage meant that a performance that would have been only slightly above average turned into something that was only slightly impossible.

She took a bow as the music ended, and the small crowd who had come to watch the recital clapped politely.

Midnight pranced slightly off the stage. The dance instructor, Miss Pirouette, raised an eyebrow.

"Miss Twinkle," the instructor said, quietly. "I am impressed."

"Thank you, miss," Midnight said, happily.

"However, I think perhaps less magical assistance next time, hm?" Pirouette coughed. "While I might be able to believe you could balance on a single hoof whilst upright, I think even the audience noticed when you started to levitate."

"Self-levitation is a very difficult skill," Midnight muttered.

"No doubt," Pirouette agreed. "You would know more of that than I would. But that is what you are learning from your other teacher, non? I want them to see what you've learned from me, not the Princess."

"I understand," Midnight said, looking down.

"Good. That said, your timing was excellent, and your balance and sense of poise is nothing short of flawless." Pirouette smiled. "Even without magic, you could turn heads."

"Thank you, miss," Midnight repeated.

"Good. Believe in yourself more, Midnight. You're more than just what spells you know."

"What's wrong, Midnight?" Cadance asked. "You've looked down ever since we got back."

"I guess I'm kind of disappointed in myself," Midnight admitted. She pushed the last few bites of ice cream around in her bowl. It was, of course, enchanted to keep the ice cream from melting. The wizard who had developed that spell was considered a national hero.

"Why?" Sunset asked. "I thought you did great."

"I did okay," Midnight said. "But I'm never going to be as good as a pony who has a cutie mark in dancing. Which is fine. I mean, I have my cutie mark in magic, and I'd be annoyed if I couldn't say I was one of the best spellcasters in the world."

"Are you thinking about quitting?" Cadance asked.

"No," Midnight shook her head. "I mean, I still like doing it. It's just kind of... I never thought about how other ponies were going to be better than me at things, you know? Like I can't always be the best."

"It takes some getting used to," Sunset sighed.

"It's not a good feeling," Midnight said.

"No, but it would be awful to be the best at everything," Cadance said. "Imagine it. You go out to eat, and you realize you could have cooked something better. You read a book, and you could have written a better story. You'd never be satisfied by anypony else's effort!"

"Actually," a voice cut in, as Celestia looked up from her very large bowl (vat, really — maybe bathtub if we're not being polite) of ice cream. "The worst thing is being expected to be the best when you aren't. Then you can't live up to anyone's expectations."

"Okay, you win," Midnight admitted. "That's the worst."

"It's something I have an unfortunate amount of experience with," Celestia said.

"So, Mom," Midnight said. "I was thinking, this weekend... could I go on a trip?"

"Honey, you know I take over for Celestia on the weekends," Sunset said. "She has the day off. I can't take you—"

"No, no," Midnight corrected her. "Not with you. On my own."

Sunset narrowed her eyes. "And why, exactly, do you want to—"

"Are you going to visit a special friend?" Cadance asked, butting in. Literally. She jumped on Sunset's lap, squishing the smaller pony so she could interrupt more effectively. "Maybe a coltfriend?"

"No! It's not a coltfrield! I just... thought maybe I'd go off on my own as a kind of experience-building thing, you know? Like..." Midnight considered. "Like, um, how you used to go out and explore and stuff on your own."

"You mean when I was hunting monsters," Sunset said, her voice muffled by the wings in her face. "Cadance, you're crushing me!"

"Hush, I'm as light as a feather," Cadance huffed.

"I don't think it's a bad idea," Celestia said, placidly.

Midnight turned to her, surprised.

"When I was her age, I was taking care of myself. Equestria is considerably safer now than it was back then."

"Mostly because you had to avoid dinosaurs," Sunset snorted.

"Sunset, please," Celestia said. "The dinosaurs were cute. I miss having them around. I had this pet stegosaurus named Mister Slowpoke because he could only waddle around. Of course, then the meteor hit and I decided to keep ponies as pets instead. Things have gotten a bit out of hoof with that, I suppose."

"Pfft," Cadance snorted. "Good one, Auntie."

"Good what?" Celestia asked, pretending to be confused.

"The joke," Cadance said, suddenly unsure.

"What joke?" Celestia tilted her head, looking at Midnight and winking so Cadance couldn't see it.

"Auntie!" Cadance pouted. "You weren't really around with dinosaurs, were you? You never talk about when you were a filly!"

"That's because I'm growing in reverse," Celestia said. "Back when dinosaurs were around I was a hundred hooves tall. Give it a few millennia and I'll be a filly again."

"Wait, does that mean I'm going to grow in reverse?" Cadance asked.

"Unfortunately, yes. We'll have to find you a wet nurse soon."

"But—" She frowned. "You're teasing me!"

"A little," Celestia smiled.

Sunset shoved Cadance off her lap and looked at Midnight. "Look, you can go, but only if you promise me a few things. First, you're going to be back by Monday. No missing classes because you want to see Neighagra Falls."

"Fine," Midnight agreed.

"Second, you can't go anywhere dangerous. No Badlands, no Yakyakistan, no Griffonstone, no Manehattan."

"I was just thinking of taking a day trip to Ponyville," Midnight said. "I've never been out of Canterlot, and it's only a little while away by train."

"Okay, that's fine," Sunset said, relieved. "That's close enough you can see it from here."

"And I'll bring some of those letters you use that get sent to Celestia when you burn them," Midnight said. "That way I can let you know when I get there and before I leave and if anything happens while I'm there."

"And what are you going to do while you're there?" Sunset asked.

"Oh, you know. Just... see the sights."

Midnight unfolded her hat and put it on her head, checking herself in the reflection of the window, the landscape flashing past on the other side of the glass. It was a classic tri-corner hat, with a few minor modifications to let it fold up and fit into saddlebags. The black cape came on next, and she looked like a proper adventurer.

Midnight admired her reflection. Maybe she should have gotten sunglasses to go with the look. Really dark and mysterious, just like Flash Fire.

"Awesome," Midnight nodded.

"It's a very nice hat," the other pony in the car said. Midnight blushed. Right. She'd forgotten that she wasn't alone. She turned to the white pegasus, the young mare still brushing her pink mane.

"Thanks," Midnight said. Cadance had told her to always thank ponies for a complement. "Um. I didn't catch your name."

"Sunny Skies," the pegasus replied. "So why are you going to Ponyville?"

"Who said I was going to Ponyville?" Midnight asked, suspicious.

"You did, when the conductor was coming through," Sunny pointed out.

"Oh, right." Midnight nodded. "Well, the truth is, I'm going there to hunt monsters in the Everfree Forest! It's like practically right next to town and it's supposed to be one of the wildest places in Equestria!"

"Aren't you a little young to hunt monsters?" Sunny asked.

"I might look young, but I'm Princess Celestia's personal student," Midnight retorted. "And I have tons of experience in tactical combat simulations."

"Simulations?" Sunny raised her eyebrows.

"Of course. Have you ever heard of Module S1 - The Tomb of Horrendous Doom?" Midnight smirked. "I led a party through that with only moderate casualties."

"Ah," Sunny said. "Only moderate casualties."

"Then there's Module X2, Attack on Titan. It takes a lot to take down giants. No problem with the right planning, though. Module ERP1, the Sexy Dragon Brothel... that was a little weird, though."

"I don't think I need to hear the details of that one."

"I still think Cadance fudged those seduction rolls," Midnight muttered. "The point is, I know how to handle anything the world throws in front of me, even when it's actively trying to stop me."

"I wasn't even aware they were having monster problems in Ponyville," Sunny Skies said.

"Well, I haven't heard any news about it," Midnight admitted. "But think about it. A town on the edge of the Everfree? They've got to have something, and since it'll only be right outside of town, it means I don't have to go on a really long quest. It'll be short and easy."

"You're just going to assume they have monster troubles, I see," Sunny sighed.

"Hey, it's a very valid thing to assume. My mom was a professional monster hunter before she retired. She'd go on adventures all the time. And you know, monsters always have treasure. I bet I can totally get some awesome stuff. Maybe even magical items!"

"That sounds very dangerous," Sunny said. "You know, there's a spa in Ponyville-"

"It is dangerous," Midnight admitted. "But like I said, really lucrative. The most risky part is going alone." She tapped her chin. "How'd you like to make a few bits?"

"Oh?"

"I could use somepony to act as a torchbearer. Have you been to Ponyville before?"

"I'm fairly familiar with it," Sunny said, slowly.

"Great! Because I need a guide, too." She pulled out a list and checked two things off. "I'll tell you what, I'll give you my usual deal. Whoever gets the kill on the monster gets first pick, then the rest goes to even shares. How's that sound?"

"Well..." Sunny hesitated. "I suppose I could use the bits?"

"Great!" Midnight smiled. "This is gonna be awesome!"

Midnight burned a letter with her magic, sending a message along to let the ponies waiting for her know that she had arrived at Ponyville safely. Hiring a guide had already paid off. She knew there was a spa, so she mentioned it in the letter and noted that she was considering spending part of the day there. It might not even be a bad idea, depending on how long it took to track down whatever monsters were in the area. A long hot bath would probably feel good.

"Now where is Sunny?" Midnight huffed, looking around. The pegasus had left her alone to write the letter, and mentioned she'd be back after taking care of personal business, but now Midnight had been waiting for her for almost thirty seconds.

She started tapping her hoof on the ground, annoyed.

An eternity (or at least five minutes of eternity) later, Sunny touched down next to Midnight.

"I'm sorry about that wait," Sunny said. "So, where to first? The Spa?"

"Don't be silly." Midnight rolled her eyes. "First, we go to the local tavern to hear about the rumors."

"The local tavern?" Sunny blinked. "Aren't we a little young to be drinking? Especially at..." She looked up. "Nine thirteen in the morning?"

Midnight followed her gaze, expecting a clock. Instead there was just the sun. Midnight considered that for a moment, then patted Sunny on the back. "You can tell the time by looking at the angle of the sun? Great! That means we'll be able to use it as a compass. According to a book I read, regular compasses don't work in the Everfree. Some kind of chaos magic makes them go all wonky."

"Um, yes," Sunny said. "Something like that."

"Anyway, just trust me. A tavern is the place to go for up-and-coming adventurers. We've just gotta pick a good one." She scratched her chin and looked around as they walked down the main street. "Aha! There!" She pointed.

"Sugarcube Corner?" Sunny asked, amused. "Why there?"

"Because it's a bakery and cafe, and it's breakfast time. There are a bunch of ponies there." Midnight smiled as she walked towards the door. "Plus the fresh pastries look really awesome."

"I can't argue with that," Sunny agreed.

"Let's get a table in a dark corner," Midnight said. She stepped in and looked around and... there really weren't any dark corners.

"It's very cheerful," Sunny noted.

"Darn. If we're not sitting at a dark corner ponies might not take us seriously," Midnight mumbled. "We'll have to take our chances." She led Sunny over to a table and sat down.

"It's polite to take off your hat when you're indoors," Sunny Skies noted. Midnight blushed and took off her Official Monster Hunting hat, putting it on an empty seat.

"Good morning!" A chipper mare said, coming to the table. "You look like new faces in town! What can I get you this morning?"

"I'll have a croissant, with extra butter and some jam," Midnight said. "Do you have cider?"

"Only pear cider," the waitress said. "We used to get apple cider but, well, there was an accident a few years ago." She shook her head. "Doesn't bear thinking about. There's orange juice if you'd prefer."

"I'll have the juice," Midnight said. "I'll cover your breakfast, Sunny."

"Really?" Sunny smiled. "Then I'll have the chocolate cake."

"One slice of double-chocolate cake," the waitress noted.

"Ah, yes. One slice," Sunny mumbled, as if that wasn't quite what she'd intended. "Also some hot tea, if you have it."

"Of course, dear. Is orange pekoe okay?"

"Certainly," Sunny Skies smiled.

As the waitress left, Midnight looked around, making sure she hadn't missed any good spots for brooding in.

"Do you think there are gonna be any ancient crones giving out quests?" Midnight asked, quietly. "I mean usually ponies just come up right away when they see adventurers and tell them what's going on around town."

"Maybe they don't know you're an adventurer," Sunny suggested.

"Hm. I could stand up and give a great speech," Midnight considered. "I did almost bring Shining Armor to tears once when I gave a speech to the ponies of Munchie Town. But that might have been because it was right after Twilight blew all her luck points to one-shot his bad guy in our first encounter with him. She lost the character, but it was a really great way to go. Totally heroic."

"I–I see?" Sunny clearly had no idea what Midnight was talking about. "But you know, I've heard a little about monster hunters."

"I thought you seemed a little too in-the-know for a peasant," Midnight smirked.

"What I heard was that even Celestia's very best monster hunters didn't just go out looking for trouble," Sunny said. "They got their information through official channels. Reports made to the crown, petitions from towns that were having problems, and stories from the local news."

"That's a great idea!" Midnight grinned. The waitress returned with their drinks and food. Before she could say anything, Midnight turned to her. "Could we get a copy of the local paper, too? I want to get caught up on anything strange happening around here."

"Strange, in Ponyville?" the mare smiled. "Well, I'm sure you'll find something. I'll bring over a copy of the Foal Free Press. It's complementary to anypony who buys breakfast."

"Thank you, Ma'am!" Midnight said. "You know, Sunny, you're been a great help and- wow, you sure did like that cake." Midnight blinked.

Sunny blushed and put the plate down. She had been licking the crumbs from it.

"It was very good cake," Sunny muttered.

"Here you go," the waitress said, giving Midnight the paper. Midnight thanked her again and started paging through it. She started absent-mindedly nibbling on her pastry, then looked down at it.

"Oh wow," Midnight muttered.

"It's good?" Sunny asked, over her second slice of cake.

"Really good," Midnight nodded. She put the paper down and glanced over it while she ate. "I need to remember to ask if they'll ship to Canterlot."

"So, any news about monsters?" Sunny asked.

"Indeed there is!" Midnight smiled. "Look at this!"

"Pets Missing, Monster At Large," Sunny read. She almost sounded disappointed, which Midnight discounted because it was, of course, impossible. She was getting a full share of any loot, which Midnight knew from memory would improve the morale of any hireling to maximum.

"According to this, there've been a bunch of disappearances of pets," Midnight said. "And at least one pony has reported seeing the monster that dragged her cat away!"

"If there's a monster, maybe you should go back and tell a professional," Sunny suggested. "Like Sunset Shimmer. I've heard she's an expert."

"Nah," Midnight shook her head. "If it's only hunting pets it's not that big of a deal. This is gonna be a cakewalk, and you like cake, so you should enjoy it too. Besides, this way I can show my mom that I can totally handle the responsibility that comes with following in her hoofsteps as a monster hunter!"

"Oh my," Sunny sighed, under her breath.

"Also, I'm gonna show the Princess that I'm the best student she's got. I bet Twilight Sparkle never fought a monster by herself!"

"I don't know if Celestia would make her students fight monsters, especially before they're ready," Sunny said, evenly.

"Maybe you're right," Midnight admitted. "But I want to show her I am ready, you know? Twilight is always impressing her and getting better grades and showing off spells that she dragged out of some book I've never heard of... I sometimes feel like I'm just... there too."

"I'm sure that you're just as important as Twilight," Sunny said, quietly. "And I bet if you applied yourself you could do just as well."

"I probably could," Midnight admitted. "But I don't want to do just as well. If I'm only doing exactly as well as she is, if we're just copies of each other, I'd hate it even more. So I gotta do things she doesn't. She wants to read books and study theory? Fine. But I'm gonna go out and really use my magic. Just like my mom would!"

"..." Sunny looked hesitant. "I understand. You want them to be proud of you, in ways where they won't be comparing you to Twilight."

"Exactly," Midnight nodded. "Plus, you get way more experience points hacking monsters than you do during study and downtime."

"Ah yes, that too," Sunny smiled softly. "I'd almost forgotten."

"Let's go have a look at the scene of the crime."

"And it was standing here?" Midnight asked, standing in the yard and looking around. The pink mare nodded, not leaving the doorway. The home was on the edge of town, part of a new development that had been put in a few years ago after more business had started coming to the small farming community. It wasn't exactly pushed up against the Everfree, but if a monster was going to come out of the woods and go into town, it'd be the first place the beast would find.

"It was as big as a panther!" the mare sighed. "But it was just so horrible! It had tentacles and too many legs and my little Wigglesman saw it and ran howling away, and it chased him, and he never came back!"

"I see," Midnight said, looking at the ground. "Your cat went through the fence here?" She pointed at the low fence around the property, mostly just to keep the garden tidy than to keep anypony out. Or, in the case of the cat, to keep them in.

"That's right," the mare said.

"Hm. But there aren't any tracks here big enough for a creature like the one you described," Midnight muttered. "Did it jump over the fence?"

"No," the mare shook her head. "It just kind of went through. It might have burrowed under it. I haven't gone into the back yard since I saw it. I just can't wait for the Debris Clearing project to be done. Then we won't have these creatures coming so close to our homes."

Midnight looked at the fence. It was flimsy, but not broken, and there weren't any holes dug under it, not that something like a cat would bother when it was only shoulder-height for a pony.

She opened a gate and looked around outside of the yard. There were worn paths there, behind and between the neighboring manors.

"But here..." She stopped and cast a spell, enhancing the pattern in the dirt. Pawprints, as big as her hoof. "Bingo. Hey, Sunny, stop lazing about on the roof! I've got a lead!"

"You do?" Sunny blinked, her head popping over the edge of the roof.

"Yeah." She looked at the yard, then the tracks. "About ten paces... that narrows it down."

"Narrows what down?" Sunny asked, hovering over Midnight.

"No- just land already! That wind will disrupt the tracks!" Midnight huffed. Sunny Skies landed next to her, looking bashful.

"Sorry," Sunny said.

"I still know the way it was going. We'll pick it up again if we go this way."

Midnight led Sunny over the hills towards the distant woods. They passed a few stumps in the ground and piles of cleared brush before either of them realized what they were looking at.

"I think this used to be part of the Everfree," Midnight said. "Can you feel that? The background magic here is all strange."

"But why would they clear it?" Sunny asked, frowning. "The Everfree is a protected forest."

"They might have gotten special dispensation," Midnight noted. "They'd have to go to the local mayor and get permission to get the area zoned for development."

"I'll have to have a chat with people later," Sunny muttered.

"Look," Midnight said, stopping and picking something up. A little scrap of red fabric. "Cat collar. Unfortunately for Mister Wigglesman, I think we're on the right path."

"I'm surprised you know how to track things this well," Sunny said.

"I got some really great tips from the Guard field manual, and Twilight's brother never argues when I use it to get situational modifiers. Plus, simple Eagle's Vision spells help a lot with picking out details." Midnight shrugged. "An earth pony would actually be better at this. Their connection to the earth would give them a situational bonus."

"If you say so," Sunny Skies said, as she trotted beside Midnight. "Are you sure we shouldn't turn back? The Everfree can be very dangerous for the unprepared."

"Unprepared?" Midnight laughed. "I'm the most prepared pony in the world. I've got a collapsable ten-hoof pole, fifty feet of silk rope that I borrowed from Cadance, a bag of marbles, a flask of oil, another flask of whisky-"

"Where did you get a flask of whisky?" Sunny said, sounding displeased.

"One of the Guard officers is sort of sweet on me. He's not really my type, but mare, you wouldn't believe how much Iron Toe has helped me out with. I'd be in so much trouble if Celestia ever found out!"

"I'll keep that in mind if I ever need a favor," Sunny said, very evenly. "I will definitely remember that name."

"Anyway, if I'm right, there should be a cave around here..." She started looking around. "The entrance might be disguised, but it'll be big enough for us to get through pretty easily."

Sunny looked around. The area was still relatively clear, except for the debris of the logging operation.

"Should I look from the air?" Sunny asked.

"Nah, caves are actually really hard to spot from above," Midnight said. "Good thought, though. Ah! Look! A stream!" She ran over towards the water. "Perfect! Caves usually form near streams. Follow me!"

"Why are you so sure there's a cave?"

"There's always a cave, Sunny!" Midnight yelled. "Always!"

"We'll see." Sunny Skies rolled her eyes.

"I can't believe there was a cave," Sunny muttered.

"Look, I know pegasi don't do so great underground, so just stay behind me and hold the torch," Midnight said. "If anything happens, most animals are afraid of fire."

"Is that why we're using a torch instead of a magical light?" Sunny asked.

"That's one reason," Midnight nodded. "It's also important for ambiance. I used to use magical lights all the time, but Cadance convinced me that torches were traditional."

"...Right," Sunny said.

"Hey, what's that?" Midnight asked, pointing. Sunny turned to look and found only a dripping, empty stone corridor. She turned back to ask what Midnight had seen, and found herself looking at another empty corridor. Midnight was nowhere to be seen.

"Ah..." Sunny looked both ways again. "Midnight? Are you there? This isn't funny. I really don't like these tight spaces."

She took a step forwards, trying to see if Midnight had just turned a corner.

"Midnight?" Sunny called out again. "Where did you go?"

Something moved in the shadows. Sunny sighed in relief. Until she saw two tentacles waving in the air, and a creature like a burgundy panther with thin yellow stripes across its body stepped into the torchlight.

"Oh Harmony," Sunny muttered, looking around. "Midnight, you'd better not have gotten eaten by this... thing!"

The monster stepped forwards. Sunny held out her torch.

"No! Bad! Back!" She wiggled the lit torch, the monster watching the flames. maybe Midnight had been right about monsters being afraid of fire. Not afraid enough, though. It took a step forward. It had awfully sharp looking claws on those six legs, and the tentacles were lined with hooks like a squid's.

Sunny threw the torch. If this went much further, she was going to have to do something drastic.

The torch went right through the monster like it was just an illusion spell.

"Hah!" A voice yelled, as a bag popped into visibility before spilling its contents over the corridor. White dust filled the damp air for a moment, and the image of the monster in front of Sunny flickered and faded, another beast showing up a few paces further back, sneezing and caked in the...

"Flour?" Sunny asked.

"I got it from the bakery before we left," Midnight explained, as she dropped her illusion spell and came back into visibility. "Sorry about vanishing there, but I needed to find the monster's exact location."

She charged up a spell and tossed it at the monster, the beast folding and collapsing, lying still.

"Simple Sleep spell," Midnight explained. "Come on and help me tie it up. It won't wake up for at least ten minutes."

"What is it?" Sunny asked, genuinely curious. Midnight took out the rope she'd gotten from Cadance, which had already been used far more for restraining ponies than any sort of mountaineering.

"It's a Common Mountain Displacer Beast," Midnight said. "A female one, to be exact. They're smaller than regular displacer beasts and really vulnerable to sleep spells because they hibernate."

"Is that so?" Sunny raised her eyebrows.

"Of course. See, their fur has a special low-level magical field that moves their image a few paces away, like a mirage. In a tight place like a tunnel, it could only be backwards or forwards of its true location." Midnight smiled. "I was able to figure out the distance thanks to the tracks and the description of where our pet-snatching victim saw the monster standing. It's relatively constant for adult displacer beasts."

"I see..." Sunny muttered. "And when the torch I threw went through the monster-"

"I knew that it had to be in the opposite direction of the apparent image," Midnight nodded. "They sense heat and track it, because their displacement also affects their vision, but not heat senses. The torch was getting all its attention, leaving me free to reveal the true location with flour while you acted as bait."

"That's rather ruthless," Sunny noted.

"I wasn't going to let it hurt you, but a Sleep spell is single-target. I couldn't cast it until I could see what I was aiming at."

"So what now?" Sunny asked.

"Now we find the lair and take the treasure!" Midnight said, brightly. She strutted towards the back of the cave. "That was a female, so it'll be alone. The males don't have stripes and only stay with the females during the mating season, and that was months ago."

"And you learned all this from... simulations?" Sunny asked.

"Yep! The Manual of Menaces is really detailed."

"Maybe they should make it part of standard Royal Guard training," Sunny considered.

"Here we go!" Sunny said. "Treasure room!" The tunnel opened up into a small room, roughly dug out of the dirt and lined with sticks and leaves and ferns like a nest. There was a noise coming from inside.

"I thought you said it would be alone?" Sunny asked.

"It should be, unless..." Midnight frowned and peered over the edge of the nest. Three kittens, newborns who hadn't even opened their eyes yet, were crying softly in the leaf litter there. "Oh."

"Oh indeed," Sunny said. "She was a mother."

"Is a mother. She's still alive."

"Isn't a monster hunter supposed to kill monsters?" Sunny asked, curiously.

"It hasn't hurt any ponies..." Midnight muttered. She grabbed a letter from her pack and started writing a quick note. She was silent for a few minutes as she scribbled on the paper with her quill. "Grab the torch and go outside and burn this."

"Outside?"

"Sometimes when you burn them underground the letter gets stuck and doesn't travel to the intended destination," Midnight explained. "And you wanna get out of here anyway, right?"

"What will you be doing?" Sunny asked.

"Just go burn the letter."

Sunny took the letter outside and looked at it. The front simply said 'Celestia - Important' in large block letters. It was quite an attention-getter. After making sure Midnight hadn't followed her, she opened it up and read the contents.

Princess Celestia,

I apologize for the short letter, but this is an important matter. I found a displacer beast that has been hunting in town and eating pets to feed its litter. It doesn't seem this is typical behavior, and it seems that there is illegal logging in the Everfree forest that has reduced game. The displacer beast is currently unharmed and restrained, but I could use some guidance on what to do with it and its cubs.

- Midnight Twinkle

Midnight was still looking at the kittens when she heard hooves on the stone behind her. "Sunny? What took you so-" She turned to see a massive white pony ducking her tall head to fit into the cave. "Princess Celestia! You got my letter already?"

"I was taking the day off, so I decided to handle it myself," she said. "I told your friend to go to the local spa. She seemed a little worn out, and after your last letter, it sounded like a nice treat for her."

"Thank you for coming, Princess," Midnight said. "Um, I'm not really sure what to do here. The displacer beast isn't really evil or anything. It hasn't even hurt anypony. I couldn't just put it down when it's a hungry mother, you know?"

"I know," Celestia smiled. "That's very wise of you. More wise than I would have expected from a pony who went directly against her mother's wishes about doing something dangerous."

"I, um." Midnight blushed.

"That said, this was the right thing to do," Celestia said. "Do you know I used to have one of these as a pet?" She leaned down to nuzzle one of the kittens. It mewed, pleased with the soft contact. "They're actually very loving creatures when raised properly."

Midnight glanced back down the corridor. "The book didn't mention that..."

"I doubt it would. They were never domesticated. Of course, I'm not sure that any cat has ever been domesticated, they just tolerate ponies because they keep getting fed."

Midnight laughed a little at that.

"I took the liberty of casting a Deep Slumber spell on the mother," Celestia said. "It was starting to wake up and... well, I am surprised at your skill with restraining animals. I don't think it would have hurt itself trying to get free, but I am also not entirely convinced some of the knots aren't purely ornamental."

"Cadance gave me some tips," Midnight said.

"Ah, yes," Celestia noted. "That does explain things."

"What are we going to do with the displacer beast?"

"We?" Celestia blinked.

"Well, I mean, you're here to help, but it's my responsibility, so I should be helping."

"I think in this case all that can be done is relocating them," Celestia said. "The woods are too damaged here to support the amount of game they'd need, and if they could forage further into the woods, it no doubt would have already."

"It's only a Common Mountain Displacer Beast. They're not that strong," Midnight said. "There are probably bigger predators deeper in the Everfree that it's afraid to cross."

"Indeed. Even more afraid than it is of ponies," Celestia agreed. "I will have to ensure that more predators don't find themselves driven into civilization by this."

"So where should they go?" Midnight asked.

"It's already been preying on pets, so it would be too dangerous to put it anywhere near a town, because it's learned it can hunt there. And with new cubs, I would be afraid of moving it too far. I'm afraid the safest thing would be to put it in the Royal Game Reserve. There are some areas sectioned off for predators, and I believe a few are free."

"...And you had one of these as a pet?" Midnight asked.

"A long time ago," Celestia confirmed.

"And having them on hoof on Canterlot doesn't affect your decision at all?"

"Midnight, please," Celestia smiled. "That would be absurd, even if they are fluffy little balls of tentacles and fuzz."

"Of course, Princess," Midnight said.

"And you'll be welcome to see them too. I've alerted the royal game warden to meet me here. Why don't you go into town and meet your friend at the spa? It's going to be a few boring hours of nothing here."

"Okay, Princess," Midnight sighed. "Um... I'll tell mom what I did, okay? Let her hear it from me."

"I think she'll be proud. Also angry." Celestia paused. "And that statement rather describes Sunset quite well. Proud and angry. Have fun at the spa."

Midnight leaned back, relaxing. The spa was actually really nice after a long day. It was probably worth a least a full die of healing. She'd have to bug Twilight's brother about it next time they could get him to actually run a game.

"I'm glad you decided to let it go," Sunny Skies said. "It was probably more scared than you were."

"That's obvious, since I wasn't scared at all," Midnight said.

"Are you upset that you didn't get any treasure?"

Midnight was quiet for a moment. She'd kind of had her heart set on getting a pile of gems and gold and maybe a magical wand or ring.

"No," She said after thinking about it.

"You're not upset?"

"No, I mean, I did find treasure," Midnight said.

"The magic of friendship," Sunny agreed.

Midnight sat up and snorted. "No, I mean that while you were gone getting Celestia, I searched the lair and found the loot stash."

Sunny sputtered. "What?!"

"Yeah. Not much in it. Mostly old pet collars and stuff. But see, Displacer Beasts are attracted to heat sources and also shiny objects, because they can see them clearly." Midnight's horn lit up and she pulled a gem out of her saddlebags. "I don't know if it's a garnet or a ruby."

"It's as big as a chicken's egg," Sunny whispered.

"It's pretty big, yeah," Midnight admitted. "I want you to have it."

"Me?"

"Definitely. This adventure wouldn't have been as fun if I had to do it alone, and I basically took up your whole day. I want you to have something to remember it by."

"Are you sure? It could be worth a lot."

"You said before we started you could use the bits, right? I'm sure. But in return..." Midnight smiled. "I heard my mom talking about something in the north. Apparently some kind of star fell out of the sky up near the Barrier Peaks between Equestria and Yakyakistan. Wanna help me plan an expedition?"

Epilogue

Dear Princess Celestia,

I know you were disappointed that I decided to stop being your student, but Discord wasn’t wrong when he told me I hated feeling like I wasn’t special enough. Midnight and I get along fine but I want to be thought of as my own mare and not just part of a matched set.

Nightmare Moon, or Princess Luna, since she lets me call her that as long as we’re in private, has been teaching me a lot. Mostly different types of repair spells since we’re trying to put the Castle of the Twin Sisters back together.

The good news is that we apparently get mail service out here! I don’t know why they have postmares going through the Everfree Forest twice a week and I’m afraid to ask. Luna suggested we repair the old road, but after a thousand years it’s more like building a new road from scratch and that seems like it’s a job for engineers and not magic.

Give Princess Cadance my best, and tell Mom and Dad to stop worrying, I haven’t been kidnapped by an evil force of darkness. Luna has tried explaining things to them in their dreams but that only seems to have made things worse.

Your Former Student,
Twilight Sparkle

Celestia,

As we discussed via other means, the six ponies sent by Mrs. Twilight Velvet to vanquish me and return her daughter to safety have been released largely unharmed.

Please tell her again that I did not kidnap her daughter, the last discussion didn’t take.

HRH Princess Nightmare Moon
Exact Realm TBD
Castle of the Twin Sisters

Postscript: We need to hash our respective spheres of influence out. You bring the map, mine are out of date. I’ll bring Twilight to yell at her parents on my behalf if you can ensure they don’t try stealing her away.

Post-Postscript: Now that I write it out, Princess Nightmare Moon looks odd in print. Queen would be fine but I suspect even if I signed my letters that way I would be the only pony using the title. I might have to follow your advice and allow ponies to call me Luna again.

Auntie,

Are there any spells that you can use to tell if a pony is pregnant? Please reply quickly and discreetly and don’t tell Sunset I asked.

Cadance

Cadance,

First, why did you send a letter? Just come to my room and ask me in person if you have a question. I’m right down the hallway.

Second, is there something I should know? I have a great many questions (how, who, and when chief among them) and in lieu of asking for specifics, I will await a reply to this letter which I expect will contain everything I need to know.

Third, I’ve attached a scroll with an appropriate spell. Just follow the instructions carefully.

Celestia

Midnight,

You were right. The northern wastes are incredibly boring. Celestia sent me and Cadance to survey them, but I think she just wanted us out of the castle for a while. You wouldn’t believe how much snow and ice there is between Equestria and Yakyakistan. The Yaks think the whole place is cursed. Why she ran a rail line into the middle of nowhere I can’t imagine.

She’s got my full report, but try and knock some sense into her for me. There’s no way ponies would ever want to move up here so surveying the land is a stupid plan.

Sunset Shimmer

A woman stopped in front of the statue. There was a letter lying on the ground, a little scorched around the edges and still smoking. She picked it up carefully, wary of the embers around the edges. The envelope was thick and textured, obviously very expensive. The front was addressed, sort of, in flowing, precise script.

To Whomever Finds This: Please deliver this letter to Twilight Velvet and Night Light if possible.

Some people would have stopped there with a letter not addressed to them. She could have tossed it back to the ground, or put it in a mailbox, or even tried to deliver it herself. The person who had found it was the type to ignore little rules of privacy and courtesy when she was curious, though, so she opened it and read the message within.

My name was Twilight Sparkle, and I haven’t been able to get a message home in a very long time. I don’t even know where to begin. I want you to know that I’ve been happy, and everypony has taken good care of me. I’m sorry for not writing before but we didn’t know it was even possible.

The woman blinked. Everypony?

I’ve included a blank sheet of paper. It’s enchanted so anything you write on it will show up on a sheet I prepared on my side. I know there’s no magic where you are, just please try. If it doesn’t work, you might be able to reply the same way I sent this.

The other sheet of paper in the envelope was the same thick material as the envelope, and the woman could swear it glittered in the corner of her eye, even if it seemed normal when she looked right at it.

I can’t come back home yet. The way I got here is broken, and only small things like this letter might be able to get through. If the paper doesn’t work, there should be a flat surface near where this was found. According to my information, it becomes a portal for three days, every thirty moons. You should be able to send letters that way.

I hope to hear from you soon. I’m a little scared to reach out like this, but I want to know where I came from, and I want you to know you don’t have to worry.

If you can’t reply for some reason, I’ll keep sending letters anyway every time the portal opens. Maybe someday I’ll be able to repair it and visit you in person.

-Midnight Twinkle, frmrly Twilight Sparkle

The woman looked at the statue in front of her. The front of it was marble, polished almost to a mirror gleam. Her eyes drifted from the name on the small memorial at the base of the statue to where it was signed on the letter.

“Twilight Sparkle, huh?” She asked. She touched the statue. There was a tingle, like static electricity.

“Is something wrong?” Another voice asked.

The woman turned. “Oh, Principal Celestia. No, nothing’s wrong.” She stuffed the letter into her jacket. “I was just picking up some trash.” She held out her hand to shake. “I hope I’m on time for the vice-principal interview.”

“Ten minutes early, actually,” Celestia said, shaking her hand. “It’s good to finally have a face to put with the name, Miss Shimmer.”

“Please,” the woman said. “Sunset is fine.”