When I wake, I am refreshed. Magic courses through my veins, as it does every morning. As a direct result, the temperature inside Golden Oaks is intolerable. I rise and make my way to the runes carved in my bedroom wall. A touch of my horn ignites them with purple light and the temperature immediately begins to return to a more livable level. Also immediately, I am lesser. By the time I return to sleep tonight I will scarcely be able to think, let alone walk, from the strain of keeping it up all day.
I walk out of the bedroom and nearly trip on Spike's discarded basket. A few weeks ago he took to sleeping outside the bedroom rather than within it, and he now keeps his distance from me throughout the day. The reason is very simple, if slightly unpleasant. I stink. My fur is matted, hair greasy and breath stale. Every fold and crease on my body is slick with sweat on which bacteria feast. They are fatted on the liquid, and the body odour they produce is revolting.
I would obviously prefer it if this were not the case, but the simple fact is that water is too precious to use for anything other than drinking. As is, it is no-one's fault that my stench is enough to make the poor dragon, with his lack of sweat and keener sense of smell, gag when I get too close. Therefore, there is no reason to feel sad about it. I mostly manage, though I really miss hugging him.
When I enter the library's main chamber he is sat on a cushion reading one of his comics. I don't make him do a lot of chores these days. In fact I regret making him ever do so many.
"Spike!" I call out, "I will be in the cellar, would you mind grabbing me at five to noon for the usual logging?"
"Sure thing Twi'," he responds. I don't tell him I love him, because he's a teenager and teenagers cringe when their sister/guardian fusses over them, but I do. I really, really love him.
The second I get down into the cellar the relief is palpable. It is more than cool enough down here for me to work comfortably. I walk to the table in the centre of the room. I run my hoof over the two spheres, fixed in place by a standing enchantment. I have been planning this for a few days.
Proof of principle, I would say were anyone to ask. Distracting yourself from how utterly stumped you are, they may accuse. The truth is we would both be a little right. But I know how my mind works. I will accomplish nothing by sitting and despairing. I need to achieve something, then siphon off the useful insights and burst of intellectual fervour to apply to the larger problem. Besides, I really need to be certain.
With a small spark, the model begins to move. The central sphere remains totally stationary while the outer one gently orbits it. I look over at the blackboard, checking for the third time the force was correct. Specifically, I was looking for the smallest possible realistic force outside of the realms of anticipated spell deviation, accounting for calculated minimum error and size proportionality. When I cast this on the outer sphere, it feels like I haven't cast anything at all.
Effectively I haven't. Allowing one of my coat hairs to drop onto it would have still resulted in an order of magnitude greater disturbance to the outer sphere than I just cast. Still, I was looking for the lowest possible significant error of what should have been a perfect system, or as close as you could get. Therefore it was always going to be nigh-imperceptible.
I watch, and it only takes the precise positional measurement enchantment a few moments to turn the outer orbiting sphere red. At first it is a mild tinge but this builds and builds until what was once shining metal is a vibrant, almost neon red. It hadn't even taken two revolutions. Okay, principle proven.
At my next workstation I have four chess pieces set up. Two queens and two pawns, with the queens enchanted to each have motion control over both pawns each. Obviously nothing happens, these are inanimate chess pieces. But, however, had they been autonomous, they could have spatially manipulated the pawns as intrinsic magical expression, as opposed to magical expenditure. More to the point, it was all done in one single enchantment. It had taken me weeks to work out how to formulate and perform such a spell.
Casting this enchantment had been incredibly costly, so much so that I hadn't been able to cast my cooling spell and had to warn the entire town as well as sleeping on the cellar floor. Now though, the work will be simple. I pick up one of the queens and roll it in my hooves. With some slight, and predictable hesitation, I grasp it in my magic and incinerate it. A quick once over of the ash confirms that is has indeed been severed from the enchantment system fully.
A take a steadying breath. I feel sick. I look at the three remaining chess pieces and scan the system. It's dying. The remaining queen can act on the pawns less as time goes on. I estimate mere seconds and the system will collapse entirely. I don't logically understand why I feel such despair at these results. I already knew this was happening. Proof of principle, not proof of occurrence.
I imagine a wheezing, sweaty, frantic-eyed alicorn. I imagine her choking over stolen breaths. Her skin is sallow, mottled. Her eyes bloodshot. She stinks of death.
The second I feel myself begin to cry, a more rational party of myself fastens my eyelids shut, plugs my own tear ducts. I take a nearby quill and jam it into my cutie mark, until all I can feel is pain and anger. Once it is done I allow myself to open my eyes again. I dab around them with my hoof. One tear shed. Not bad, but not desireable. Water is too precious.
What happens when a god dies?
I force myself to be academically interested in a question no one knows the answer to, rather than mourning over what I will soon lose. If I allow that, then I will cave in from the inside out. I will die with her.
The princess is not long for this world, that much we know. Worse than that, is that we know more. After the attempted Changeling invasion, the new leadership was determined to show it was the work of a fanatical splinter group. That the changelings were allies of Equestria, not foes. We could all tell they were utterly terrified of any retribution. It was a vengeance we weren't planning to take, of course, but we weren't going to abandon such a sudden and unexpected political advantage.
Celestia had gone to see them on a diplomatic visit, but she had still been recovering. I had told her not to do it. Told her to wait until her full strength. Why didn't she listen? Why didn't she listen?. The changelings, contrary to popular belief, pre-dated us. They even predated Celestia and Luna. I believe we may have actually evolved from them, instead of a common ancestor.
Down in that hive, a place ponies had never gone to, crawled bacteria and diseases that changelings would shake off easier than a common cold. But we're not changelings. These species were totally foreign to us. Once the gash under her right wing, apparently not healed enough, had gotten infected with whatever filth those things allowed to propagate it had been over. She came back from the mission lesser, and she got lesser everyday. There existed no magic to heal, they were two different spheres of expertise entirely. It wasn't fair though. Celestia was a god. It was some stupid infection.
The changelings were horrified. On the face of it, the leader decried the accident as just that. An awful, unpredictable accident. Behind closed doors their new leader, a stocky and plump female specimen named Genesis, was frantic and panicking. She was in tears when she came to see Luna and I. She fell to the ground, panicking and hyperventilating. She cried frantically that they really hadn't done this intentionally, terrified of retribution. It was a vengeance Luna was deliberating whether to take.
Their hivemind allowed them to track down Chrysalis' hiding place easily enough. Her public drawing and quartering eased some troubled waters. The whole thing sickened me.
On the last day, it was Luna and I only. She had initially been surrounded by a multitude of advisers and lawmakers but Celestia was far too gone to say anything of value now. We dismissed them all. She sat, sweating in bed. Horn aflame and eyes scrunched. If she was trying to heal herself, it was a pipe dream even at the start, now it was active self-harm. I whispered in her ear, begging her to stop, to rest. She didn't listen, or didn't hear. The effect was the same.
I had so much to say to her. To thank her for. I didn't get that time, neither did Luna. The sun goddess opened her eyes suddenly. Her pupils pinpricks, darting around in terror. Her last words were nothing at all. No significance, no sentimentality, no relevance or sense or insight. Just utter nonsense. Mares on the precipice of death were rarely lucid, but I had really hoped she would have been different.
"My maths!" she choked, her voice a strangled parody of its former serenity. Then Celestia died. It was abrupt and without ceremony. To her credit, Luna had the strength to stretch a wing around me, the pony in that room who had lost less, when I started to cry.
What happens when a god dies?
Nothing at all.
"Twilight!" Spike calls out. I have been staring blankly at a picture of Celestia for what must have been at least an hour. I shake myself into focus and go back upstairs. The room in interminably hot compared to the cellar. I had forgotten it was nearly noon. The cooling spell helps but I still need to take a minute to acclimatise.
I go to set up the experiment. Spike moves away from me when he thinks I can't see, but I notice. I stink. Under a large bronze tube connected to the library's roof is a kind of plinth. I open a nearby draw and take out one of the hundreds of identical packages within. I take off the thin paper wrapping and examine the metal cube. It is free from visible scratches or imperfections of any kind, which means it is acceptable for use.
One minute until noon, Spike reminds me. I place the cube on the plinth, directly under the bronze tube. I position the temperature monitor. Something else that took a significant enchantment. However it will now accurately track the internal temperature of the cube at the precise internal centre.
It was further linked to the nearby timer, as well as the bronze tube and pocket-watch in Spike's hand. At noon, the tube's cap would flick off, allowing a precisely focused beam of the noon sun to hit the cube. At this precise moment, the timer would begin recording how long the tube had been open. Then, when the centre point of the cube reached exactly 60 degrees Celsius, the cap would flick back on and the timer would stop. All I had to do was place the cube.
It was one of the finest systems I have ever designed. Experimental perfection. Or as close to that as you can get I remind myself strictly. It reaches noon and the system begins. Spike and I only have to wait. Well, I wait. Neither of us have to do anything now that the system is recording. Spike in fact goes back to reading his comics. I will go out later, at midnight, and get him some more. I'll get him anything he wants actually, I couldn't do any of this without him.
I press my right forehoof painfully into my left one and fasten my eyes shut again. Water is too precious.
Eventually, the system reaches 60 degrees and everything shuts down. I move the cube into a nearby container, full of them. We can't reuse material in the experiments. It would introduce error and even if the error would be miniscule, likely insignificant, I will leave nothing to chance. It was good quality metal though, we'd find a use for it. I just had to think.
"Twilight, Twilight! You need to come and look at this!" Spike shouts. He sounds panicked. I told him not to use the observation slits during the day. Why couldn't he listen? It's not time to chastise him now, there is apparently a more immediate problem, but I will chastise him later. We can't afford any slip-ups.
My initial thought had been that the sun itself was in mourning. But then, I had been in mourning myself, and couldn't see I was letting my poetic side overtake my rationality. Suns don't mourn. I wish they did. It was now late September, yet it was hotter than July and heating all the time. Something wasn't right at all. The weather ponies had no clue. I have a theory about the sun. By every god, living or dead, I hope I'm wrong.
Fortunately, there are more seasoned experts on heavenly bodies than me in Equestria. It just so happened I was on near-sisterly terms with the world's foremost.
The train was horrible. Not too cramped, but the small windows didn't open nearly as wide as I would have wanted. There was a heavily pregnant mare, younger than me who looked to be particularly struggling. When I left the train in Canterlot, several ponies rushed onto the carriage in a panic, and I didn't see the mare through the windows. Had she fainted? I chewed my lip, and thought of all the pregnant mares who may faint across the country today. I didn't have time to think of just one.
My walk to the palace was uncomfortable. I hadn't been here since...
Guards bowed their heads in sympathy. I really wished they'd stop. Black and grey sun-banners hung still from every lamp-post. Three months isn't long compared to millennia.
I knew Luna's schedule down to the minute. I knew that when I arrived I could catch her leaving court and going to meet with her advisers. She hated meeting with the advisers. 'A viper-pit of duplicitous, contemptible sycophants' Luna had remarked in the letters we shared now that I was her faithful student instead. Not all ponies in the country had seen Celestia's death as a tragedy. Many had seen it as leaving an attractive power vacuum, and even the foulest cream had a habit of rising.
When I reach the hall, right on time, she is predictably about to head to her personal counsel chambers. She looks more exhausted than I have ever seen her. Celestia's death excavated me. I cannot imagine what it did to Luna. The short-term solution was that I didn't think about it too much.
When I call out to her, her relief upon seeing me is clear, but tinged with a concerning note of fear. Her advisers look at me with a plethora of different reactions. The older, proven ones look fondly. The newer ones in unmasked scorn. I don't care for any of them quite frankly. I need to speak to the princess.
The observation slits were long, narrow pieces of glass, enchanted to keep out the worst of the sun. But it was still a slight risk, and Spike should not have been using them. I know he's young and doesn't really understand, but we have ground rules for a reason.
But that can wait. I peer through, and recognise what he was referring to with a cold feeling of horror. It was Mrs Cake, and she wasn't standing. She was nearby, close enough for me to already see the sunburn beneath her coat. She'd probably been out there for twenty minutes now. He breathing was gasping, pleading. But the hot air burned lungs and made one choke. Oxygen wasn't enough. There was a reason I installed those runes in every house in the village, there was a reason all the unicorns in Ponyville were especially vulnerable.
Earth ponies were resilient, but Mrs Cake was now closer to fifty than forty. This was not a fall she was getting up from. Why had she done it? I had told them what the rules were. You don't leave your house between the hours of 4:00 and 22:00. A hour or two later would be one thing, but it was noon. Medicine, most likely, that was what caused most people to try it. They could get their food parcels at night, and waiting a day if they forgot was trivial. Water came through the tap as usual. Plumbing safeguards enforced the strict ration we had in place.
But if someone you love is ill and already weakened from the lack of food and water. If you think they're going to die, and the only chance they have is to take medicine that you don't have, wouldn't you try it? And Mrs Cake lived with her children, she lived with Pinkie Pie. I pulled the slat shut. It was too much to think about. Far too much to risk.
"Twilight!" Spike screamed, "We can't leave her out there!"
He ran on stubby legs to the front door, and reached for the bolts. So small, so slow.
Do you know why dragons keep their hoard in caves? No? Okay, something else then. Do you know why dragons, in flagrant opposition to every other hibernating creature in the world, tend to sleep through the summer instead of the winter? I never used to know the answer to these questions. Of course I had theories, but not the unequivocal answer. I suspect the only creatures to actually know were Celestia, Luna and the dragon clans themselves.
I grasp Spike in my telekinesis, drag him away from the door and pin him to a wall. He screams at me the whole time. He tells me he we have to help Mrs Cake. He tells me I'm letting her die. He's right.
I found out the answers to these fascinating questions about dragons when Spike nearly died. He collapsed one day a few months back. You see, dragons can bathe in molten lava and douse themselves in fire all they want, their scales protect them. But those same scales have a particular weakness. Harsh sunlight.
It's fascinating really. Those scales aren't disconnected mineral laying on top of the dragon's skin. They have a blood supply. And within them are species that are will readily photochemically react to produce urea when absorbing photons of wavelengths specific to sunlight. This build-up will usually only have the effect of making the dragon a little sluggish and more easily confused. They hibernate not because they'll die in summer, but because they're more vulnerable. They don't even have to do it. Spike doesn't.
But if the sunlight became particularly harsh, for example, the build up can become lethal. It nearly had with Spike those three months ago. Now? If Spike went out that front door he'd be more likely to be killed than me. I am in my mid-twenties. Strong enough to grab Mrs Cake and bring her in to safety at my full strength. But I'm not. I'm low on food, water and I am the single largest provider of magic to the rune network in Ponyville.
Would I make it? Could I get her in time? Earthponies are stronger than unicorns by several orders of magnitude. And all that strength means so much muscle. She'd be heavy. I am weakened. Maybe with my telekinesis? But then what about the rune network? This all assuming I actually reach her without collapsing. Because then Spike would follow me out, and he'd certainly die.
Not to put too utilitarian a spin on it all, but if I die then that's another scholar not researching a solution to what is happening. Without Spike I cannot communicate with Luna anymore either, I'd have to take one of the night trains and move to Canterlot permanently. Then the Ponyville rune network collapses anyway. Neither of us are close to expendable, certainly not as much as poor Mrs Cake. Is that disgusting? Yes, inarguably it is. But here we are.
So yes, Spike, I am letting Mrs Cake die out there. I see multiple houses, multiple potential helpers. Many closer than us. Maybe they'll help? He continues to scream. I fasten my eyes shut. Water is precious.
I get minutes, if that, to talk to Luna. Her advisers are waiting, I can't get her far enough away. We reach the maximum distance when they start to tiptoe after us. It'll have to do I suppose. I explain the situation to her, and her eyes tell me I'm right, and that she already knows.
But then, she's now the sole princess of Equestria. A mare with millennia of experience as regent of the moon and a head of government. Of course she knows. And every few seconds, her eyes flick around. She looks back at her advisers. They clearly haven't worked it out yet. I imagine, from her expression, that I am the first. She's pouring with sweat. When I am finished, she thinks on what she wants to say, but to the crowd it is clearly too long.
They approach and she looks panicked. She wants more time and I don't know if we have it. She opens her mouth, but falters. The advisers have arrived. They tell her that time is precious. I believe they're right. The scene would be almost comical in other circumstances, the spluttering moon princess whisked off by the chattering crowd. Luna turns to me and speaks as they pull her away.
"She's our friend! And you just left her there! I don't care about your stupid rules, what's the point of them if we can't even save our friends?! I... I hate you!" Spike screams at me. I don't remind him about our rule concerning crying. I think that would most likely worsen our problems now.
I also don't respond. I feel like that would also make things worse. Whatever bubbling feelings of anguish I experience when he tells me he hates me are worth it. He can only hate me if he's still alive, and I will keep him alive. He runs upstairs, little legs working overtime, then slams the bedroom door. It's okay, I can do the rest of the work today by myself. It's a lot for someone his age to take in.
I walk back to the experimental set up to analyse the results. On the way I walk by that observation slit but elect not to look through it. A part of me is ashamed by my despicable cowardice, but a larger, more dominant part knows I cannot help anyone if I'm mourning. The time is shorter than yesterday by a minuscule amount. Added to this, since the pegasi couldn't manipulate the weather during the day anymore the method was fraught with error. Despite this it was the best monitoring method anyone had right now. And the general trend was clear
I plugged the time into the equation, a monstrously complex series of functions designed to spit out one value. The distance from between our world and the sun. It's shorter than yesterday's value by several hundred kilometers. Not surprising given the trend. My greatest concern is not the shortening distance between our two spheres, rather it is the seeming uptick in the rate at which it is approaching us.
I thought about Luna's words to me all day, and as I sit here on the train I reach a moment of cold, terrifying realisation. I realise Celestia was more than lucid in those last moments. I realise she most likely had worked out what was going to happen and didn't have the time to tell us. I realise her last words were her desperate realisation of a simple mathematical error in the force she applied to keep her heavenly body rotating. The same force error that had sent it plummeting it towards us.
But alone, this would not be a concern. No, it is in tandem with what Luna told me that could make it the doom of our species. Of every species in fact. Because as her advisers pulled her to her stupid, unimportant clerical responsibilities the princess had turned to me and rasped, eyes wide and panicked...
'They've gone feral'
I add the data point to the chart. Too early at this point to see whether the trend was truly exponential, or whether this is a simple series of extraneous results. All there was to do was continue the search for a solution, and wait for more results. Because the queens had lost control of the pawns now, The moon and sun were released from their masters when one of the system's parts was removed. Feral. Soon no amount of runes will be enough to save us.
From a nearby house, I hear a scream. It would seem another villager has seen Mrs Cake. I wonder how many more of them had before now. I wonder, when the sun sets and we can go outside, whether Spike will tell Pinkie what I let happen. I wonder whether she'll understand.
I fetch another quill from the desk, and fasten my eyes shut.
