Memories With a Student

by Mystic Sunrise

Rating: everyone
Tags: Twilight Sparkle, Slice of Life, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Flurry Heart, Alternate Universe, Original Character, Science Fiction
Length: 4762

Far in the future, Twilight remenises with her latest student.

Many millennia have passed since Twilight Sparkle ascended the throne as the sole ruler of Equestria. Though her friends are long passed, she still lives by the lessons of those long-ago days.

In the time since then, ponykind has traveled to the stars and now live across countless worlds across most of the known galaxy.

Equestria itself is no more, burned away as ponykind evolved. Now Empress Twilight and Empress Flurry Heart rule a galaxy-spanning kingdom from the Throne World of Harmonia.

This year, as she has every year for years beyond count, Twilight returns to the city once known as Canterlot to remember all that has gone before. And this year, her newest student, Orchid Aura, will join her.

Published 2020-02-10 01:10:01 UTC
Last updated 2020-06-22 02:31:50 UTC

Chapter 2

"... And on that day, Friendship truly was magic. The Legion of Doom sealed away, and Grogar's bell destroyed," Twilight finished as her hoof settled on the post Battle of the Bell photograph.

Orchid looked down at it with renewed awe. She had heard of this long ago battle, but this was the first time she had ever seen anything from that day. Neither Twilight or Flurry liked to talk about it.

And from the story she had just been told, she really couldn't blame them. "So what happened to Discord? Please don't tell me you let him off with nothing like you guys did when he sided with Tirek?"

Twilight shook her head, a vindictive look coming to her eyes. "No. Not this time. He said it was to test me to see if I was really ready to take the throne as Equestria's sole ruler, but no one bought it."

"Not even Fluttershy?" Orchid asked as she looked at the Pegasus in question.

Twilight rolled her eyes. "Especially Fluttershy. She was the only one to ever really call him a real friend. Starlight and her group kinda just put up with him, and Spike and Big Mac only really hung out with him during their O&O games."

"So what happened to Discord then?"

Twilight frowned. "We combined our alicorn magic with the magic from the Tree of Harmony and banished him from Equus altogether. He's still alive I know for a fact. But he can never return."

Orchid's mouth dropped. That wasn't what she had been expecting at all. "Isn't that a bit much?"

Twilight shook her head. "He twice betrayed Equestria, and nearly doomed the whole world. All because he thought he was some sort of friendship expert. So no. It wasn't too much. He pops now and again all over the place, but only a few of us know who he is."

Orchid gulped. Her mentor very rarely ever spoke like this. Only when she ever spoke of something that truly angered her would she ever speak with this much venom in her voice. Luckily, those times were rare indeed.

She did have one question though, leftover from the battle. "So, whatever happened to the Legion of Doom? Stupid name that it is."

Twilight giggled. "It really was a stupid name I agree. As for what happened to them? Well..."

***

Twilight tried not to frown as the light-filled her vision, but it was difficult to do in a time like this. This was something she thought she would never do. But she could not forgive herself if she didn't at least try.

When the light faded, the one on the right spoke first. "Sparkle. Come to gloat at us? I see you've gotten bigger since the last time we met."

Twilight tried not to growl at that. "Hello, Tirek. Chrysalis. Cozy Glow. I see your time away has not changed you much."

The former queen laughed. "If you think we'll beg for mercy, or change our minds, then you're a bigger fool than I thought."

Twilight shook her head. "No. I don't expect you to do any of those. In fact, I would rather be done with you three forever and call it a day. But I will not do that. Not yet anyway. I need to know something first."

"And what's that?" Cozy asked.

Twilight, in turn, looked at the older two. "Simple. If the three of you had somehow won, would you have stayed allies? Or turned on each other in the end? I've always wondered that."

That got a roaring laugh out of Chrysalis and Tirek. "What a stupid idea. Us? Actually getting along for that long? What kind of idiots do you take us for Sparkle?" Chrysalis sneered.

Tirek nodded. "Then we are agreed on that much at least. I would have sooner taken their magic for my own," Tirek added. "I only put up with them because they served a useful purpose."

Cozy Glow looked at the two of them with a horrified look. "But. I thought we were friends?"

That got an even bigger laugh out of the two adults. "Idiot. We only put up with you because we needed you. Why would we ever be friends with a pony? Let alone a brat who thinks she's on our level," Chrysalis replied.

Tirek nodded. "I do need to thank you for getting me out of Tartarus like that." He sneered as he flicked Cozy in the head, a move that sent her flying a good twenty feet. "But our relationship is over, you simpering brat."

Not even Twilight could believe what she had just heard, as Cozy picked herself up from the ground. The light had gone out in Cozy's eyes, her shoulders slumped, and her tears beginning to fall. This betrayal had broken her.

Tirek turned back to Twilight. "Before I suck your magic out Princess Twilight, tell me. How long has it been?"

Twilight's frown grew. "It's been over a thousand years you were beaten Tirek. No one aside from me, Celestia, Luna, Cadance, and Flurry Heart, even remember you ever existed."

"And what's that supposed to mean?" Chrysalis asked.

Twilight smiled as she looked at her. "Not a single changeling alive even knows you existed Chrysalis, let alone your name. They forgot it within a few generations. I had nothing to do with it. The whole world wanted to forget you three ever happened, so it did."

Tirek and Chrysalis shared a surprised look. Both could tell Princess Twilight was telling the truth, and why wouldn't she? She gained nothing by lying to them. "Then what do we do now then? I have no plans to ever be a goody four shoes," Chrysalis sneered.

"I do not either," Tirek added.

Twilight nodded as her horn began to glow. "I was hoping you two would say that. But I had to hear from the two of you myself." The light around her horn grew brighter. "Stone prisons are so last millennium, so I have a new prison for you two. It's called the Phantom Zone. A place only an alicorn can reach and none of us have ever let someone sent there out yet."

Before either could ask what she meant by that, a portal appeared above them. Moving down, it seemed to swallow them whole. Once it reached the ground, the portal winked out of existence, leaving no trace they had ever been there.

Twilight nodded as she turned away. A part of her hoped that one day, both Chrysalis and Tirek would change their ways, and she could let them out of the Phantom Zone. But another part found it hard to believe.

She was surprised to see that Cozy Glow still sat next to the tree she had been flung at. Her tears were still flowing, and it broke Twilight's heart to see a pony so broken, so crushed.

Whatever else she had done, Cozy had once been her student, and a part of her had never outgrown that teacher role she once had at the School of Friendship. But she kept her face unknowable as she walked over to the filly.

Cozy looked up at her with a listless look. "Do whatever you want to me. I don't care anymore. I don't have any place to go now, and you don't want me back. You never did. Not then, and not now."

Author's Note

No, I'm not sorry about what I did with Discord. I absolutely hate how Hasbro took the cheap and lazy way out with Grogar in Season 9. So there it is.

As for the Legion of Doom? Well, I also regret nothing I did with them. The Phantom Zone used here is the same as Superman's. But other than that, and who can open it, it has no connection to DC's character.

This also only changed Fluttershy's bit in The Last Problem. Rest stayed the same.

Chapter 3

For a moment, Twilight almost did. She almost gave in to her darker side and give Cozy the same treatment she did to Tirek and Chrysalis. A side of her that she didn't think of much.

Her counterpart at Canterlot High had called her Midnight Sparkle. The darkest, and most violent, aspects, of their personality. A side the princess only knew she had after coming to the throne of Equestria.

Whether it was the same thing, she didn't know. But on days like today, Twilight almost gave in and let go of her normal self, and became her darkest side.

But it was the sight of Cozy's broken expression, the vacant look in her eyes, that stopped her in the end. She couldn't bring herself to do it. No matter how much the filly might have deserved it.

Cozy looked at her in surprise as she was lifted up by Twilight's magic. "No Cozy. I won't do it. As much as you might deserve it, I won't do that. I won't make the same mistake Celestia and Luna did."

Cozy gave her a look. "And what's that supposed to mean?"

Twilight frowned. "I was never happy with what the three of them did to you three. You were beyond trying to redeem, that I knew for a fact. But this wasn't the way to resolve it. Discord paid for his part in all of this in the end."

"And what Sunbutt and Moonbutt?" Cozy asked.

That got a giggle out of Twilight, as she smiled. "I need to remember to call them that the next time we meet. But I will not send you back to the School of Friendship. It doesn't exist anymore."

That surprised Cozy. "Why not?"

Twilight rolled her eyes. "Besides it was one of the stupidest ideas I have ever had? Starlight and her friends ran it into the ground. Maybe I and my friends set a bad example of nepotism, but it barely lasted fifty years before it closed."

Now Cozy was really shocked. "I didn't think Professor Starlight was that bad."

Twilight shook her head. "It wasn't Starlight in the end, but that is a story for another time. I am not making you my student Cozy. I am sending you to somepony else."

Cozy gulped. "Who?"

Twilight grinned. "Celestia and Luna. They complain all the time that they're bored on Neo Ponyville, so I'm going to help them with that problem."

"Neo what now?" Cozy asked.

Twilight chuckled. "Equus is no longer the only world we inhabit Cozy. We now live on a dozen planets, and that's counting Equus itself. Or Harmonia as it's now called."

"When did all this happen?" Cozy asked, still confused, but beginning to get some of it.

"Over the last thousand years," Twilight replied. "A lot has changed since you were last flesh and blood." Her smile softened. "But I am not sending you out into the unknown totally unprepared. I have several books that will help you to understand all that's changed. It's either this or join Tirek or Chrysalis. Your choice."

Cozy gulped. She didn't even want to think about what had happened to the two who she had thought were her friends. "Golly, when you put it that way... When do I leave?"

Twilight smiled. "A shuttle leaves for the Harmonia Aether Gate in one week. That should give you time to get a good start on reading. I will let Celestia and Luna know they will be expecting something on that shuttle. I just won't tell them what it is."

Cozy was lost again. "Why not?"

Twilight frowned. "Payback, for a lot of things. Let's just leave it at that."

***

"... Safe to say, Celestia and Luna were not happy when they met Cozy," Twilight finished with a smirk. "But I reminded them that they had asked for this. And that they still owed me for quite a bit."

Orchid gave her teacher a look. She felt there was more to it than that. "So what happened to Cozy Glow then?"

Twilight smiled. "Whatever Celestia and Luna did, it worked. I never heard a single bad report about her. The last I heard of her, Cozy had settled down and started a family of her own. I thin her descendants are still around as well."

Orchid let out an audible sigh of relief. She had never thought any of this could be possible, but the evidence was right in front of her. She did however notice one character missing from all of Twilight's stories. "What about Spike?"

Twilight's breath hitched, remembering her Number One Assistant. "Not even dragons live forever Orchid. Spike stayed as the Friendship Ambassador for a long time. But after Rarity died, he went to live among his own kind. I promised him that if he ever came back, he would always have a home to come to. He never did."

Orchid looked at her teacher with worry. "Did you two have a fight or something?"

Twilight shook her head. "No. He left with my blessing and a lot of tears. But I couldn't, or wouldn't, stop him. He still wrote to me all the time of course." She giggled. "He never really grew out of needing me in a way. He and Smolder eventually became mates and raised quite a few hatchlings. I was never more proud of him than at that time."

She sighed. "Eventually though, time caught up with them. From what their son Blaze told me, they just went to sleep one night, and never woke up. I think it was right they passed on together. Ember made sure all dragons remembered them."

Orchid looked at the massive blue female, the Bloodstone Scepter tiny in her massive hands. She almost looked like her dad, Torch. "Did he and Ember ever, you know, like each other like that?"

Twilight chuckled. "I asked Ember the same question once. She said she had found Spike nice to look at, and had thought about it, but had never acted on those feelings. Spike said pretty much the same for Ember, but neither ever did do anything about it. Smolder knew about it, but she didn't really care."

Orchid giggled. "Pretty mature of her."

Twilight giggled as well. "Hanging out with her friends from the School of Friendship did that to her. You just never could say it to her face. She would deny it all the time."

Chapter 4

Orchid soon noticed something up against the far wall. If she wasn't seeing things, it looked like a mirror of some kind. But why would it be here? Unless. "Is that what I think it is?" She asked, pointing at it.

Twilight's ears dropped as she looked at the mirror and the memories it held. "Yes. That was the World Mirror. I'd almost forgotten it was there."

Orchid looked at it in awe. She knew the story of course. Of how Empress Twilight had traveled to another world to retrieve the stolen Element of Magic, and in the process, made seven friends that would last a lifetime.

Her gaze fell on a battered and beaten old journal, the sun in glory cutie mark faded almost beyond recognition now. "What happened? You guys didn't get into a fight, did you?"

Twilight shook her head, smiling. "No. Far from it in fact. It was the march of time. The girls eventually graduated, and I was proud to be there and watch them do so, and eventually drifted apart. Sunset came back to Equestria after that. She had no reason to stay behind."

Orchid gave her teacher a look. "That doesn't seem fair. I thought they were friends?"

Twilight sighed. "We all were Orchid. Some of the best friends I have ever had. But after graduation, someone finally spilled the beans about the magic at Canterlot High. We never did find out who it was. But the damage was done."

Orchid's heart dropped. She didn't like where this was going. "What happened?"

Twilight's eyes glistened as she fought back the painful memories. "The girls destroyed their geodes. But not before we permanently destroyed the connection between our world and the Human World. It took all of our magic, combined with their own, to sever the connection forever."

She sniffed as her tears fell now. "Sunset had left her journal with my counterpart. There was just enough magic left in it so that she told us that the geodes were gone forever now, and magic had ceased to exist in their world. They had enough to write one last message before the Journal went dark for good."

Opening the Journal in front of them to the very last page. On it was a simple message, addressed to both Princess Twilight and Sunset Shimmer, and two photographs. One taken on the night of that fateful Fall Formal, and the day the Rainbooms had graduated from Canterlot High.

Twilight's smile grew as she read it again, as poignant now as it had been that first time she and Sunset had read it.

"Rainbooms Forever!"

Twilight wiped her eyes, only helping slightly. "After that, I moved the mirror to storage and kept the Journal in a safe place only me, Sunset, Starlight, and Spike knew about. Sunset stayed with me in Canterlot for a while before she moved to the Crystal Empire." She giggled. "And, go figure, she and our world's Flash Sentry ended up dating one another, and eventually getting married."

Orchid rolled her eyes a bit. That seemed a bit corny, but whatever. "You weren't mad?"

Twilight scoffed, wounded at the very thought. "Mad? I was the one who married them. Flash and I had tried to date for a while not long after the Battle of the Bell, but we both eventually found it just wasn't going to work. We were still friends of course, but we both moved on. I was happy for both of them."

"You've never been married?" Orchid asked.

Twilight shook her head. "It was just after Flash and I stopped that I found I didn't even like boys like that. And very few mares were less interested in my position and what it could give them than they were in me as a pony."

"And that goes double for me," a new voice said, as Empress Flurry Heart trotted into the room, a knowing smile on her face as she and Twilight shared a muzzle. "Why did I know you would be here today of all days Aunty?"

Twilight chuckled. "It is important to me Flurry. No matter what else has changed since then."

Orchid was lost as she looked at the two alicorns. "What? What is it? Am I missing something? I don't think I've missed any holidays."

Flurry giggled. "It's not a national holiday, no matter how much Aunty Twilight wanted it to be."

Twilight glared daggers at her niece. "Excuse me for not being in the best mood at the time. I was in mourning. Ponies do stupid things in that state."

Orchid turned to her teacher. "What happened?"

Twilight's glare melted into a sad sigh as she slumped. "Today marks the anniversary of Applejack's death. The last living, non-alicorn, Element of Harmony. Three hundred years old, and as stubborn as the day we first met."

Flurry nodded, her own expression softening. "Mom had to take over for a time while aunty mourned. For a while, we even thought she might try and kill herself."

Twilight nodded, a hurt look in her eyes. "It took me longer than I wanted to really get over their deaths. I never once thought of making them alicorns. I loved them, but even I wasn't that insane."

Orchid thought about that for a moment. It all made sense now. Why her mentor was always like this on this day every year. No matter where they might be in the galaxy, on Harmonia, another planet, or between worlds, Twilight always became a recluse on this day. Not even Orchid could get to her.

She had known most of these stories since she had become Twilight's student. But she had rarely ever heard them told like this. They felt more real now. She looked at Flurry. "So that's why you told me where to look?"

Flurry nodded, smirking. "Aunty really needs to stop being a stick in the mud about other ponies knowing about this. Especially students. It's not fair to them. You're the first in a long time to see this Orchid."

Twilight nodded, mentally kicking herself now that she thought about it. "Flurry's right. I have done this for too long, and not let other ponies know why I do." She draped a wing over Orchid's back. "You're not just my student Orchid or my friend. You're like family. All of my students have been. I never told them enough. No more."

Orchid's smile lit up the room as she hugged her teacher, one that was happily returned by Twilight, and they were soon joined by Flurry Heart as well.

Chapter 1

No, Twilight Sparkle thought, as she looked at the aged and faded photos before her. She was not crying. No. That would be silly for her to do. It was liquid pride, as her brother had once called it. A totally different thing.

Yep. That was her story, and she was sticking to it if anyone came upon her now. But this portion of the palace was known only to a very select few. Just how Twilight liked it.

The photos before her now meant more it seemed because of how much everything had changed since that time. How much Twilight herself had changed since the day she had taken over from Celestia and Luna. But even more so.

How Equestria and the world around her had changed.

Though, Equestria had not been a term used by anyone but her and Flurry Heart for over ten millennia. And Celestia, Luna, and Cadance, whenever they popped up. It didn't seem right to use the name now.

Even the planet itself had received a new name. Though that was a relatively recent change. Or recent to Twilight at least. It not been called Equus for a long time now.

"There you are. You know how much I hate having to look for you," came a new voice in the chamber. One that Twilight knew quite well as the voice of her Faithful Student brought her back to the present as she looked over at the door.

Orchid Aura was giving her an exasperated look. One honed over years of being the personal student to one of the two most powerful ponies on Harmonia.

Empress Flurry Heart would argue who was more powerful between her and her favorite aunt, but she and Empress Twilight didn't really put much behind it. They'd been at the game for millennia now.

Twilight smiled as Orchid walked over to stand beside her. Orchid may have grumbled as a wing was draped over her, but she pulled close into the embrace anyway.

"And that's why I do it. I've got to keep you on your hooves. Besides, you've got it a lot easier than I did at your age," Twilight replied in a playful tone.

Orchid rolled her eyes. "Oh sure. Being the personal student to co-ruler of over half of the known galaxy is so much easier than saving the world."

Twilight pouted for a moment before both mares broke into giggles. It always helped to ease Twilight's mind when she was like this when she could drop the mask. The mask of, as Orchid said, co-ruler of a star-spanning empire. Only Flurry Heart and Orchid ever saw her like this.

After a moment though, Twilight turned serious. "All that aside, is there a problem. Or were you just wondering where I ran off to?"

Orchid shook her head. "No, there's not a problem. Not yet anyway. But I'd been wondering where you always run off to this time every year, and why we keep coming back to Harmonia when you have so much else going on."

Twilight sighed. She had meant to show Orchid this room in time, but this was not how she planned it to go. But she would make the most of it. "Let me guess. Flurry Heart pointed you over here didn't she?"

Orchid grinned as she looked around the room. For as out of the way, as it was, it was considerably cleaner than she thought it would be. "Yep. So what is this place anyway? Where are we? I've never seen it, and I thought I'd been everywhere in this city."

Twilight smiled as she too looked around. "You wouldn't have found it on any map. No current one anyway. This is in the Old City of Canterlot. This was, at one time, my bedroom in the Canterlot Archives."

Orchid scrunched her nose. "Canterlot? That hasn't been a thing in, what? Ten millennia? Nothing of it was supposed to still exist. At least on the surface. Ponies always said some parts of it still existed in the lower reaches of the mountain."

Twilight's smile dropped. "When the Old City was abandoned for New Harmonia, I insisted they keep this. As a reminder of where we came from. It's been here ever since."

Orchid finally looked down at what her teacher had been looking at when she had come in. Just a bunch of really ancient photos of ponies and other creatures that looked familiar for some reason. One unicorn, in particular, stood out for her. "Is that Luster Dawn?"

Twilight's smile returned. "The one and only. My first student when I first came to Equestria's throne properly. She was also the one that finally convinced to abandon the old practice of only taking a unicorn as a student. I've always been grateful to her for that, and so much more."

Orchid looked at the bright pink unicorn in awe. She had always heard about her from Twilight and even Flurry Heart. But few records had ever shown what she looked like. She wondered why that was as she looked at the other photographs. "And the rest of these?" She asked.

Twilight's smile grew if it was possible as looked at them again. "Memories. Friends and family long ago passed into the Summer Glens."

"And this one?" Orchid asked as she pointed at one in particular. One that made Twilight tear up slightly as remembered that day.

"One of the most important days of my life. Even more so than some that came afterward," she said.

Orchid scratched her head. "Do you remember them?"

Twilight scoffed and shot her student a hurt look. "Of course I remember them. I remember them like they happened yesterday. Some ponies back then thought I should become an emotional wreck when my friends died. Or that I should have died with them and hoofed over my responsibilities to someone else."

She remembered one pony in particular who had got it stuck in their head that immortality was nothing but a curse and that she was suffering because she would always be alive while others would grow old and die around.

Twilight found the whole idea laughably insane, to be honest. Of course, she would always miss her friends and family. That was a given. But she had never let it define her and what she did. If she mourned every death on Harmonia or the galaxy for that matter, she would never get anything done. And she liked getting things done!

She watched as Orchid sat down with an expectant look on her face, and she sighed. Her student always did love a good story, and who was she to say no to that? They were a lot alike in that regard.

Twilight slid a hoof over the first, and oldest photograph. "It all started here really..."

Author's Note

To be clear, that is the Orchid Aura from Long Live the Empress. Aside from the setting change, and Twilight not being a literal goddess here, she is still the same character.

I always found it dumb that Twilight would still take a unicorn as a personal student. So I had it be Luster Dawn that finally convinced Twiggles to break that cycle.

So now, Twilight has had ever kind of creature as her Faithful Student over the millennia. Even the occasional Xenos. For the races of the old Equus are not the only races in the galaxy.