"Oh! Luna! Over here!"
Luna paused in her shuffling, lifted her head, and blinked groggily. Had somepony called her name? Surely not. Nopony calling out to her could possibly do so with such good cheer. Not here in Canterlot. Not after years of Nightmare Moon.
While most of the native populace had grown used to her, and thus ceased to treat her as anything other than a distasteful novelty, visitors were another matter. As the nation's capital, Canterlot's temporary population at any given moment often outstripped its permanent residents. Tourists, dignitaries, excitable schoolchildren and their exhausted shepherds, traveling merchants and myriad other individuals all spent time in Canterlot without calling it home. The reactions of such visitors upon encountering the subject of their nightmares—now laid low and ostensibly powerless to hurt them—ranged from scandalized to enraged.
Luna had grown used to these outbursts, and hardly blamed the ponies—or otherwise—who did the shouting. It was only natural. She'd adapted; opted for side streets, shortcuts, and other routes that avoided major thoroughfares and would never show up on any city planning paperwork. Her current route took her through an alley that spilled out into a small plaza.
As such, hearing her name called eagerly surely meant that she'd misheard.
But no—she finally located the source of the cry: a purple unicorn smiling and waving eagerly at her.
Luna's ears perked up and she lifted her head. Of course—there was one Canterlot denizen glad to see her. "Twilight Sparkle!"
The young unicorn was seated at a small table on the patio of a streetside café. The remnants of a piece of cheesecake sat on a small plate in front of her, along with a half-empty cup of tea.
"An unexpected—and fortunate!—surprise," Luna said, trotting closer. "What brings you here this eve?"
"I'm just spending the evening with some friends," Twilight said with a smile. "I think a better question is, what's an alicorn of the realm doing sneaking through alleyways in the Upper District?"
Luna started and took a second look. There were two other ponies seated at the table that had escaped her notice. Sitting next to Twilight and wearing an easy grin was Luna's former captain of the Night Guard, Rainbow Dash. Sitting next to Rainbow Dash and across from Twilight was a yellow-coated unicorn mare that Luna was unfamiliar with. The mare wore thick glasses to match Twilight's and, strangely, a plain traveling cloak that covered both flanks.
"Apologies!" she yelped, her face burning. "It has been a long..." she paused, considering, "...week. I am, ah, not at my best."
"Naw, really?" Rainbow said, grin evolving into a smirk. "C'mon, take a seat, we still have one free," she said, pointing at the empty seat across from her.
"I, ah, do not wish to intrude..."
Rainbow rolled her eyes, slid down in her chair and kicked the chair opposite her. It jumped away from the table with a noisy clang. "Siddown. 'sides, I bet you and Moony here'll get along great," she said, gesturing at the yellow unicorn.
As Luna gingerly took her seat, the yellow unicorn shot a glare at Rainbow. "My name," she said with a final squint at Rainbow before turning to Luna with a stiff smile, "is Moondancer." She nodded at Luna, but made no further motion.
Luna returned the nod, frowning faintly, and settled back into the chair. "Well met, young Moondancer," she said, studying the unicorn speculatively. "That is... an unusual outfit you're wearing."
"It is." She gave a curt nod, then looked away and took a sip of her drink.
Rainbow sucked in a breath through her teeth, and Twilight winced. Moondancer pressed her lips into a thin line.
"So, yeah!" Rainbow blurted, pointing a hoof at Luna. "You're back way earlier than me and Twilight thought you would be! I thought you had a gig way out in Hollow Shades?"
At this, Luna's ears perked back up, and she gave a tired smile. "Ah, yes. We had a rare spot of good fortune—the local weather team was able to harness a wild storm. With the extra rain, I was able to focus exclusively on growing crops, rather than splitting my focus between that and assisting with weather management. As such, we finished several days early. Afterward," Luna's ears fell again, "The town would no longer—that is, ah," Luna stammered, "I decided that my time would be best spent here in Canterlot."
Rainbow cheered, but Twilight frowned. "You didn't push yourself too hard again, did you? Finishing days earlier than you expected..."
"Pff, she made it here, didn't she? She looks fine!" Rainbow said. "In fact," she continued, sliding off her chair and grabbing her bit bag out of her saddlebags, "We got nowhere to be tomorrow. I think this calls for a bit of a celebration!"
Rainbow slid off her seat, and vanished through the café door before anypony could raise a protest. With a wordless cry of frustration, Twilight chased after her. "Rainbow! Rainbow, wait! Ugh, she—" the café door closed and cut off the rest.
Awkward silence slammed into the table like a piano from the heavens. Moondancer slurped her drink noisily. Luna fidgeted with her hooves and pulled a wing to her front, and nibbled at the edge of a primary feather.
Luna coughed. "She is awfully headstrong, is she not?"
Moondancer's face spasmed, and she brought her cup to the table with a resounding thunk. She whipped around to face Luna directly. "What are you doing?" she growled.
Luna stared for a moment, eyes wide and halfway through adjusting a feather. After a moment, she pulled her teeth away from her wing and straightened up again. "I beg your pardon?"
"Are you serious?" Moondancer seethed, leaning forward. "You terrorize Equestria for years. You usurp the throne, establish yourself as uncontested monarch, execute any dissenters. And now you're just... trying to make incredibly awkward small talk?" Moondancer planted her forehooves on the table, leaning forward until she was nose-to-nose with Luna. "Rainbow used to work for you, and Twilight might be brilliant, but she's ludicrously naïve and trusting. But I don't buy any of it for a second. So, I'll ask again. What. Are. You. Doing?" The final word came out as a growl.
Luna was pressed against the chair's back, head reared back as far as anatomy would comfortably allow. She stared wide-eyed for a moment at the unicorn invading her space, then closed her eyes as a pained look swept across her face. "Moondancer," she breathed, with particular emphasis on the first half of the unicorn's name. "I apologize. I wronged every pony in Equestria, but those like yourself suffered a unique kind of pain." She opened her eyes again.
Moondancer was still glaring furiously, but there was a wary curiosity now. It was more than she expected—and more than she deserved—but Luna considered herself fortunate for the opportunity.
"For whatever little it is worth," she continued, "the only executions carried out under my watch were against those who made an attempt on my life directly. As for you..." Luna sighed. "There are still moments when I think myself a thousand years in the past, and allow old habits and ways of thinking to come to the fore. Back then, those who bore the mark of the moon were known as 'children of the night', and considered blessed. As were the sun-marked 'children of the sun'. But," a wince, "my reign did not treat you so kindly, did it?"
Moondancer retreated across the table and crossed her hooves, holding her glare upon Luna. "Far from it, your majesty. There's a reason I wear this thing." She tossed her head back at the cloak covering her from withers to flanks. "A pithy little I'm sorry from you isn't going to undo the last few years of hiding from my own mark because of the reaction it gets in public."
Luna hung her head. "You have my apologies nevertheless. There is much I would give to undo my mistakes, and heal the pain I have caused. The work like that in Hollow Shades helps, but I know that there are some wounds that will never heal—only scar."
After several long seconds of silence in response, Luna raised her head to find that Moondancer's glare had morphed into a contemplative scowl. Moondancer took another sip of her drink and looked away. The trailing ends of Moondancer's cloak were twitching slightly as the unicorn's tail lashed from side to side.
The silence pressed down upon Luna like a suffocating blanket, and she fought the urge to hide behind her wings again. In an effort to avoid looking at Moondancer, she instead took in her surroundings.
She was seated opposite the café's storefront. Much of the façade was taken up by a large plate glass window, which featured the name in in gilt, cursive script—Brewed Awakenings—and a number of appetizing pastries behind it. The café itself made up one wall of the alleyway Luna had emerged from, and was at the far end of a small, rounded plaza paved with cobblestones. A number of shops, restaurants and other cafes bordered the plaza.
Luna was familiar with the plaza as a necessary part of her covert route home, but she had never taken the time to view it as a place of social gathering. Under the waning light of the early evening, the cobbles glowed orange, and the storefronts blazed molten with reflected sunlight. A happy, tired susurrus filled the air as ponies enjoyed the end of a long day, chatting happily, sipping at drinks, nibbling at pastries, and carrying shopping bags.
When Luna turned back to Moondancer, she found that the unicorn was staring into the distance, scowl having faded to a thoughtful frown, cup cradled between her hooves.
"It is intentional," Luna said into the silence. Moondancer continued staring into the distance, but one yellow ear swiveled toward Luna, so she continued, "My behavior, and manner of presentation. Others find my presence disquieting. Appearing fallible sets them at ease."
"So, what, it's all an act?" Moondancer sneered, looking at Luna out of the corner of her eye.
Luna shrugged and bobbed her head from side to side. "Less than one would think. Being a ruler does not afford many opportunities for social normalcy. My sister, for example, is actually a very silly—and occasionally airheaded—pony. But few ever have the opportunity to see her outside of heavily-scripted environments. I am simply... making no effort to hide my nature."
Moondancer scoffed. "Hope you don't mind if I'm a just a tiny bit skeptical."
"If anything, I welcome your skepticism. Judge me for yourself, and ask whatever questions you find pertinent." Luna shrugged, then continued, "If we are to be mutual acquaintances, it would behoove us to at least be cordial to one another."
Moondancer stared Luna down, then closed her eyes and took a deep breath. "Fine. I don't trust you, and I don't like you, but you still have a point. If you can make the effort, I can too. On one condition," she said gesturing sharply with a foreleg. Her glare bored into Luna's skull as she continued, "Answer one question for me. Do you regret what you did?"
Without a moment's hesitation, Luna answered. "Almost every single moment of it, and without question."
Moondancer retracted her hoof, taken aback. "That was more... categorical than expected. Wait," she said, raising an eyebrow, "almost every moment?"
Luna screwed her face up into a childlike pout. "I maintain that increasing our military might was a prudent decision. Our borders have not expanded so much in a thousand years that we can afford to ignore the threats outside of them, even if our immediate neighbors have been pacified."
Moondancer blinked rapidly, expression blank, then held up a forehoof and dived into the saddlebag leaning against her chair. After furiously rooting around in it for several moments, she emerged with a notebook held in her magic. She spent several moments flipping through it, then stabbed a hoof at a particular page and let out a triumphant shout. "A-ha!" She flipped the notebook around and pushed it toward Luna. "I knew you were just a warmonger! Equestria's economy doesn't support that at all!"
To her surprise, Luna took the notebook in her hooves and perused the contents closely. After several moments of reading, she hummed and shook her head. "I thought as much. Your baseline numbers are wrong. It makes the assumption that there would need to be a significant recruiting and training drive. It also underestimates the crown's liquid funds by almost an order of magnitude."
Moondancer ripped the notebook out of Luna's hooves and jammed her muzzle up against the page, eyes flicking back and forth like ping pong balls. "What?! No! I'll give you crown funds, because that information isn't public and I had to extrapolate, but guard numbers are a matter of public record! How would you know, anyway? You said yourself that you neglected the kingdom!"
At this, Luna raised an eyebrow. "Because I published those numbers myself. I also falsified them."
Moondancer froze, then looked up slowly, head moving jerkily. She seemed to be having difficulty breathing. "You... did... what?"
Luna sighed. "My sister is a great many things," she said, rolling her eyes, "but deception does not come easily to her. Publishing complete information about one's military might is foolhardy in the extreme."
"You intentionally published false information," Moondancer breathed.
"Yes."
"To a public repository," she continued, sliding out of her chair, and stalking toward Luna.
"...yes?" Luna replied, leaning away from the advancing mare.
"How could you do that?!" Moondancer screeched, seizing Luna by the shoulders and shaking her.
The café door banged open and Rainbow Dash swaggered out, a bottle of wine tucked under one wing. Twilight trailed her with a quartet of wine glasses hovering by her side, and a look of exasperation upon her face. "Hey fillies, guess who was able to convince the shopkeeper that he had a bottle of wine after all? This mare!" Rainbow said, jerking a wing with a single feather extended toward herself.
She halted when she saw the tableau in front of her. Moondancer had seized Luna in her hooves, and appeared to be in the process of throttling her. Luna had fallen half-off the chair, and her wings were partially extended to maintain her balance. For some reason, she had a single foreleg held out toward the alley. Both mares stared wide-eyed at Rainbow Dash.
"What," Rainbow Dash began.
Moondancer let go of Luna. Without the unicorn's grip to support her, Luna crashed to the ground with an undignified squawk.
"What," Rainbow Dash tried again, "are you doing?! We leave you two alone for like, five minutes—"
"Try ten," Twilight muttered under her breath.
"—ten minutes," Rainbow continued seamlessly, "and we come back to you two trying to murder each other! What the hay!"
Moondancer pointed at Luna and sputtered, and Luna groaned from the ground before levering herself onto her hooves.
"She—she publishes inaccurate statistics!" Moondancer finally managed.
Twilight approached the table and set a wine glass down in front of each chair. "So? Lots of statistics turn out to be inaccurate. Accurate data gathering is a real challenge."
"On purpose!"
Twilight gasped, put a hoof to her mouth, then turned an affronted look upon Luna. Rainbow Dash rolled her eyes and set the bottle of wine down on the table. "Really? I thought you'd still be angry about the whole eternal night thing," Rainbow Dash said.
Moondancer's sputtering increased in pitch, if not coherence. "Among other things!" she finally forced out.
Rainbow Dash seized the cork of the wine bottle with her teeth and, with a deft twist and a hollow thoonk, pulled it free. She spat the cork into a trash bin next to the café's door and began pouring into her glass. "Well, drink up. If you're gonna be mad at each other, best way to get it out quick is to be drunk and mad at each other. Oh, and it's rosé, because somepony doesn't like red."
"It tastes like vinegar!" Twilight said, throwing her forelegs into the air and retaking her seat. "Also, I'm reasonably certain that's the opposite of the generally-accepted wisdom. Most psychology experts agree that arguing while intoxicated increases the likelihood of misunderstanding and antipathy."
"When was the last time you got drunk, Glasses?" Rainbow asked, filling Twilight's glass.
"Um... my graduation celebration."
"And you probably had, what, one glass of wine?" She turned to Moondancer and began pouring her a glass. "Moony, tell me you're not as much of a lightweight—whoa!" Rainbow jerked backward, fumbling the wine bottle from hoof to hoof before finally catching it in a wing and pointing behind Moondancer. "What the hay is that?!" she cried.
Looming behind Moondancer, obscured by the gloom of the café's awning was a titanic, quadrupedal shadow. At Rainbow's exclamation, it stumped forward into the light, and resolved itself into the form of an enormous pony dressed in the barding and colors of the Royal Guard. He was almost as tall as Luna, but with bulk to match, and colored a dark, forest-green.
Luna groaned in exasperation, and swept a foreleg toward the newcomer. "If I may introduce Specialist Straight Forward of the Royal Guard?"
"Evening," he rumbled, inclining his head.
"He is my, ah, minder, as it were. Officially, his duty is to ensure my safety, and to ensure that I fulfill the terms of my sentence."
"Ugh," Rainbow grumbled, "yeah, and unofficially it's to scare the feathers off of other ponies! You almost made me spill the wine, you big lunk!"
"Nice to see you again too, Miss Dash."
Luna rolled her eyes. "His prodigious... presence... is part of his unofficial role: reassuring others that they are safe from me."
Moondancer was still staring at Straight Forward, and had not moved an inch. She was transfixed by the enormous specimen of a pony that had crept, unheard, to within a single body length of her. "So, uh... when I jumped you just now..."
"I was signaling for him not to interfere. That, however," Luna said coolly, "did not stop him from moving from the alleyway to the storefront."
"Never hurts to be sure," he said. "Looked like you had it under control though, Miss."
Luna climbed into her chair as Rainbow Dash huffed and finished filling Moondancer's glass. Rainbow turned to Luna's and paused. "Uh, this isn't gonna be a problem is it, big guy?" She glanced at Straight Forward, and looked meaningfully at the wine bottle in her hooves.
"My job is to keep Miss safe, and keep her out of trouble," he said. "If she stays out of trouble? None of my business."
"Great!" Suddenly chipper, Rainbow resumed pouring. "Uh, Moony, you can stop staring now."
Moondancer squeaked and spun around, face reddening. "I-I wasn't staring! And that's not my name," a glare, "Dashie."
Rainbow grunted and sat back in her chair, wine distributed. "What were you two arguing about, anyway? Something boring about numbers?"
"She," Moondancer said, jabbing a forehoof at Luna, "was telling me about how she falsified published statistics about the size of the Guard."
"Oh yeah! I remember helping with that. Still think we shoulda reported higher instead of lower than actual numbers," she said, looking at Luna.
Twilight gave a scandalized gasp. "Rainbow! Not you too!"
"Uh, hello?" Rainbow pointed at her own chest. "Former Guard captain? I knew all the actual numbers? If you want, you can just ask me."
"That's not the point!" Twilight protested. "You're publishing false data that scholars and analysts rely on!"
"Yeah, no, I'm with Luna here. After some of the things that alico—uh..." Rainbow cut herself off with a meaningful glance at Moondancer.
"Our mutual acquaintance," Luna suggested.
"Yeah, our acquaintance. After some of the things she told us, it'd just be stupid to straight up tell anypony—anyone—who wanted to know exactly what they'd be up against if they tried to invade."
"While I will... reluctantly... concede that revealing the disposition of our military wasn't a great idea," Twilight said, looking like she'd taken a bite out of a lemon, "why not just avoid publishing altogether?"
Luna raised her glass to speak when Moondancer interrupted. "A lot of statecraft is about information management," she said, staring into her glass, swirling her drink absentmindedly. "In some ways, it's more about knowing what others know, rather than giving them specific information." She frowned as she continued, thinking out loud more than speaking to the group. "If she had just stopped publishing, she would have had no idea what her enemies thought they knew." She turned to Luna, and gave her a searching look. "If she published misleading information though, she had a much better chance that others would use that information, rather than gather their own intelligence. It wouldn't be a guarantee, but it would let her make much better educated guesses about how they'd behave."
Luna pursed her lips and nodded at Moondancer. "Masterfully put. I could not have phrased it better myself."
Rainbow Dash and Twilight stared at Moondancer. Twilight, with wide eyes and Rainbow, with confusion.
In response, Moondancer turned to the other two and shrugged. "What? I was part of the rebellion for a few years, remember? I made friends with the head of intelligence for the Canterlot cell. And," she said with a halfhearted glare in Luna's direction, "I'm not going to apologize for what I did in the rebellion."
"Nor should you," Luna said with sudden heat, gaze sharpening upon Moondancer. "My reign was a blight upon Equestria. You and your rebellion had the right of it. Do we hate the doctor for cutting out the cancer? No—we lavish them with praise for saving a life."
Moondancer's eyebrows shot upward and out of sight, obscured by her bangs. "Really, now?"
Luna made a sweeping gesture with her foreleg, then frowned and looked down at the wine glass still held in it. "Perhaps I'll exercise good judgement another night," she muttered to herself before taking a swig and turning back to Moondancer. "Truly. I think what you did was courageous, and is to be commended. My reign was borne of selfishness, and characterized by blindness, negligence, and failure. By almost any measure you might name, Equestria was diminished by my rule."
Twilight placed her hoof on Luna's shoulder. "It wasn't all bad. There was a lot of progress in astronomy, and fields like astrological magic!"
Luna rounded on Twilight, glaring. "That neither justifies nor forgives what happened! Do you think those mothers who lost foals will be placated by academic advances—"
"Hey!" Rainbow Dash snapped, voice a whipcrack. "Enough."
Luna turned to glare at Rainbow Dash, who responded with a stern look, and by pointing at Twilight. Twilight had curled up in her chair and was watching Luna warily, hurt written upon her face.
Luna's glare crumbled, and was replaced with a pained expression. She took a deep breath, and let it out slowly. "I am sorry, Twilight Sparkle. I just... do not like it when—well. It does not matter. That was ill-done of me."
Twilight gave her a weak smile, and adjusted her glasses with a wisp of magic. "It's okay. I just... I hate it when you talk about yourself like that. All the literature agrees that it's not healthy to dwell like that. And I... you're my friend. I don’t like it when others talk badly about my friends. Even if the one doing the talking is... well, you."
Luna winced more deeply, and took another drink from her glass. The silence hung heavy over the table.
Then, Rainbow slammed a hoof down onto the table, eyes wide. "Hey! Wait a minute! Sparklebutt, pay up!"
Twilight stared at Rainbow Dash, and slowly raised one eyebrow. "What," she drawled, "are you talking about?"
Rainbow stood in her seat, placing both forehooves on the table. "You and me! We made a bet way back when I met Moony!"
"Still not my name," Moondancer muttered.
"I bet you," Rainbow said, ignoring Moondancer, "that Luna would be totally cool with Moony being a rebellion hot-shot!"
At this, Luna blinked and raised an eyebrow at Twilight. "Is this true, Twilight Sparkle? I thought that by now you would be acquainted with my views about the rebellion."
Twilight buried her face in her hooves, and let out a groan. "Ugh, now I remember. No," she said, peeking above her hooves at Luna, "the bet was specifically about whether you would encourage her and tell her she did the right thing. I just bet that you would be okay with it." She bent over and began fishing around in her saddlebags.
"Hah, yeah! And I bet that you'd be all 'the rebellion ponies are totally awesome, and so is Moony for being one!' And I was right! C'mon, gimme gimme!"
Twilight gave a long-suffering sigh, and straightened, her bit bag retrieved. With great ceremony, she set it upon the table, drawing forth a solid clink. She undid the drawstring, reached inside with her magic and, with a flourish, drew out...
A single bit.
Which she then sent whizzing straight at Rainbow Dash's forehead.
Rainbow's wing darted out and deflected the flying bit up into the air. Her gaze followed the coin upward, and when it fell back to eye-level, she caught it upon an upturned forehoof. She shot a wink at the exasperated unicorn, and carelessly tossed the coin into her saddlebags.
"Look," Rainbow said, looking particularly at Moondancer, "I know this has been a weird evening. But I wouldn't've suggested it, or asked moonflanks—uh, the blue one, sorry—over there to join us if I didn't think we had a shot at having some fun. So, come on, let's give this a second try."
She held out her wine glass, motioning for the others to do the same. "Whaddaya say? To second chances!"
The others looked around the table, with Moondancer and Luna in particular exchanging a long, searching look. Finally, Moondancer looked away and seized her glass, nodding. All three ponies held their glasses up to Rainbow's and clinked them together.
"To second chances!" they chorused.
As they sat back and took the obligatory sip, Twilight hummed thoughtfully. "Aren't toasts traditionally made before imbibing?"
Rainbow rolled her eyes. "Yep, but somepony," she said, staring right at Luna, "got a head start on us."
Luna harrumphed and took another sip. "I am entirely committed to your debauchery, Rainbow Dash. 'Tis hardly a fault of mine if thou wert too preoccupied to join me."
"Hah!" Rainbow pounded the table and pointed at Luna. "Hah! 'Thou wert', huh? That's one, already! Since when are you such a lightweight?"
Luna blinked, and frowned for a moment, then made a small 'ah' of understanding. Then, she gave her glass an exaggerated look of surprise. "Stars, Rainbow Dash. I've not eaten since this morn, but even this little is not enough to sway me. Have you been imbibing before my arrival? I can imagine no other reason for you to be hearing such things." Luna held her mock surprise for a moment before rolling her eyes at the rest of the table. "Dear Rainbow Dash is referring to my habit of slipping into what the modern age refers to as Middle Equestrian once sufficiently drunk. T'would seem that lack of sleep suffices as well," she explained to a bemused Twilight and a wide-eyed Moondancer.
"Hold on!" Moondancer exclaimed, leaning forward. "You speak Middle Equestrian natively?!"
"In a manner of speaking," Luna replied with an arched eyebrow. "'Tis simply 'Equestrian' to my mind. Still, a thousand years is a long time for a language to evolve, and one must adapt."
Moondancer began digging furiously through her saddlebags while Rainbow blinked. "Wait," the pegasus said, ignoring Moondancer's muttering, "you haven't had anything to eat since this morning?"
Luna shook her head. "While the mayor of Hollow Shades was polite enough to offer a day to allow us to rest, it was clear that our presence was unwelcome. I decided that it was in our best interest to make haste back to Canterlot, and make the most of what free time our labor had secured."
"Aha!" Moondancer tore a dog-eared, battered old paperback out of her saddlebag and held it aloft. Bulging from between the pages was a profusion of colorful notes. "Canter Saucer's Tales! There's a passage in here that's been bothering me for years! And," she said peering at Luna with the look of an addict—or more specifically, a dedicated scholar, "you can answer my questions about language."
Rainbow mouthed Have fun, at Luna, and turned to a worried-looking Twilight. "I'm sure she'll be fine," Rainbow said. "We can deal with that whole eating thing in a little bit. Now, do you mean to tell me you that the last time you went drinking was when you graduated?" She blinked. "Wait. I thought you were still in school?"
Twilight frowned. "Well, yes. But I'm working on my doctorate now."
Rainbow returned Twilight's frown with one of her own. "A doctor? I thought you were studying some magic engineering thing?"
Twilight gently brought a hoof to her forehead. "No... a doctorate is just the highest degree an institute of learning offers. I already have an undergraduate degree in Applied Arcanics. Now, I'm working on getting a doctorate in it."
Rainbow recoiled. "You mean you finished school, then decided to do more school?!"
"Of course," Twilight said, nonplussed. "The only way I'd even be considered for some of the real research opportunities is with a doctorate."
Rainbow stared at her in horror, before shaking her head rapidly, dislodging the concept. "Anyway. Not important! So, you mean to tell me you've never gotten actually drunk? Really? What kind of student are you?"
Forehoof to the chest. Gather all the stress. Push it away. Twilight let a deep breath out. "No, Rainbow Dash. I don't see why this is so important to you!"
"Uh, duh," Rainbow rolled her eyes, "Remember that whole conversation we had in the café?"
"Yes!" Twilight cried throwing her hooves into the air, "Where I told you that we don't need alcohol to have a fun social gathering! Especially if Luna is already tired!"
Conscious of her increasing volume, Twilight glanced at Luna and found her engrossed in a discussion with Moondancer. Moondancer was gesturing animatedly at her ragged copy of Tales, while Luna shook her head and spoke quietly.
"Puh-lease," Rainbow said, ignoring the impromptu study session, "a little booze when hanging is, uh, like a sauce. You add it to things, and it makes everything at least fifty percent more awesome. That's probably why they call it getting sauced!"
Twilight responded with a flat stare. "Rainbow."
Rainbow waved a hoof negligently and looked away. "Pff, c'mon."
"Rainbow."
Rainbow heaved a sigh and turned back to Twilight. "Ugh, fine. Look," she said, leaning in close. Twilight automatically leaned in as well. "Luna really needs to relax. This is an easy way to do it, and it'll be good, harmless fun. She can't go at a hundred percent all the time. I know that one from experience. You'll crash and burn, and then somepony else has to clean up your mess. But look at her now," she said, nodding at Luna.
Luna had moved her chair so that she and Moondancer were side by side. She had taken the book from Moondancer, and was reading a passage at a deliberate pace, while the unicorn furiously took notes.
Twilight followed Rainbow's gaze. "I... can relate to that, actually. I burned out badly in my first year of post-grad. It's stressful enough, and then Celestia got banished." Twilight shivered. "It took me six months to get my head back on straight. But... I don't think Luna would go down that path," Twilight said with a frown.
"No?" Rainbow raised an eyebrow.
"No," Twilight shook her head, "I think what happened when I first met her was a... a fluke. I think it's more likely that she'd just... curl up inside herself and sort of... rot away from the inside."
Rainbow bobbled her head from side-to-side. "I dunno anything about that. But that's why I try to get her to come out with us. This is the first time she's had more than two days free at once in months."
Twilight poked Rainbow's nose and gave her a flat stare. "You know that alcohol is a terrible medication for psychological distress, right?"
Rainbow scrunched her face up and batted Twilight's hoof away. "I know," she said. "Give me a little credit. I know where to draw the line."
"And what if it turns into a full-blown coping mechanism, and she degenerates into a barely-functional addict, unable to socialize at all without a drink or two?" Twilight replied, clutching at her ears in horror.
"Eh, we'll burn that bridge when we come to it," Rainbow said, leaning back in her chair and kicking her rear legs up onto the table before taking a sip from her glass. "'sides, she's a big mare. I bet she had some ragin' parties way cooler than anything we've seen, back in her day."
Twilight gave Rainbow a look that was simultaneously impressed and scandalized. "Burn the... that's not how that idiom goes! It's cross that bridge when we come to it!"
Rainbow shrugged. "Eh, I stand by what I said. Bridges are dumb anyway. Just fly over 'em."
Twilight rolled her eyes. "We can't all be blessed with wings, you know."
Rainbow smirked and eyeballed Twilight. "Well, actually..."
"Alternate timelines don’t count!"
Rainbow cackled and finished off her glass. She reached for the bottle of wine, only to find it empty. "Hey, what gives?"
Luna didn't look up from what she was doing, but she did lift her wineglass in her magic—her suddenly much fuller wine glass—and waggled it in Rainbow's direction while a small smirk played across her features. A quick glance at Moondancer's glass revealed that it, too, had been refilled.
"Cheeky little..." Rainbow muttered. "Fine," she said to the studious pair, "Soon as you two finish those off, I'm taking you to a real bar. And," she added after a moment's thought, "it's gonna be one with the greasiest, most amazing samosas you've ever tasted."
Twilight perked up at that. "Oooh! What's a samosa?"
Rainbow shrugged. "No idea, but they taste amazing!"
It was later. Luna had a head full of buzz, and a stomach full of samosas. Rainbow Dash was leading the three—wait, four, Straight Forward was still back there somewhere—of them to yet another bar that served the best cider outside of Ponyville, I swear. She was in the lead, and hovering several paces above the street, with the unicorns and alicorn walking—approximately, the wine had done its job—alongside one another. The air was warm and clear, with a full moon shining down from above, and the glow of Canterlot's street lights illuminated the cobbles with warm pools of orange light.
Speaking of the moon, that had been a production. It certainly wasn't her first time raising the moon while intoxicated, but it was the first time in over a thousand years. She'd always been careful to wait until after moon-raising when going out with Rainbow Dash before. The nightly lunar spectacle had been unusually wobbly tonight, something that Rainbow Dash had wasted no time in teasing her about. Luna had responded by turning Rainbow's wings an eye-wateringly neon shade of chartreuse.
Unfortunately for Rainbow, that was around the same time the wine had begun to catch up to them. Despite their best efforts, neither Luna nor the unicorns were able to restore Rainbow's wings to their natural color. They were able to reassure Rainbow that the effects of the spell would wear off in a few hours.
Probably.
So, Rainbow had elected to address the problem by pretending not to hear any comments made about her wings' new color scheme. It seemed to be working so far.
"Hey, Luna!" the pegasus called back, "You said you had about a week free, right? Where's your next job thing?"
"Manehattan," she said. "I believe it to be the last of the scheduled visits. Everything afterward will be upon request."
"Awesome!"
"Yes. I thank ye," Luna said, directing a fond look at the three mares, "for this night. Whilst I suspect I shall regret my choices come the morn, I am quite pleased with the night thus far. And," she said shooting a glare at a suddenly-smirking Rainbow, "thou shalt bite thy tongue. Ye is vastly superior to the modern," and here, she gave a theatrical shudder, "'you all'."
Twilight just giggled, while Moondancer threw her hooves in the air. "Yes! Thank you!" she cried. "I cannot believe we gave up an entire pronoun! It's so useful!"
"Uh, I knew some ponies that say 'y'all'," Rainbow suggested.
"Eugh," Moondancer spat. "Eugh! Maybe if I wanted to sound like a yokel. No thank you." Moondancer paused, then turned to Luna. "Did I thank you for going through Tales with me earlier? I forget that sort of thing sometimes. So, uh, thanks."
"Pffft, eggheads!" Rainbow made a face at the two and blew a raspberry.
"Hey! There's nothing wrong with eggheads!" Twilight made a grab for Rainbow with her magic and missed as Rainbow flapped higher, whooping. She galloped after a laughing Rainbow, attempting without success to grab the pegasus with telekinesis.
Luna giggled and patted Moondancer's shoulder with a wing companionably. "The pleasure was all mine, friend Moondancer. And, if I may," she continued, expression growing curious, "why did you stay, at the beginning of the evening? You could have easily made some excuse—it was quite clear my presence made you uncomfortable."
Moondancer bit her lip and looked away. "I... look. I may have hated your guts, but it's not every day you get a chance to talk to a living source of ancient history. I couldn't just pass that up!"
Luna just smiled. "Hated, hm? Past tense?"
Moondancer harrumphed. "I also owed it to Twilight to give you a chance. We... may have talked about her friendship with you before."
Luna raised an eyebrow at this. Moondancer failed to meet her eye.
"Okay, argued."
Luna hummed thoughtfully. "And now?"
"Well... at the beginning of the evening, you mentioned 'children of the night'. I, um. I think I'd like to hear more about that," she said, glancing behind her.
Luna followed her gaze and found herself staring at Moondancer's cutie mark. Her cloak had fallen to the side to reveal a violet crescent moon, surrounded by a trio of magenta stars.
"It would be my honor," Luna said with a brilliant smile.
Author's Note
A little interlude to see how Luna, Twilight and Rainbow from For Want of a Horseshoe are doing. A tiny bit of wouldbuilding, if you squint.
I've posted a short retrospective blog post, as usual.
