“I’d like to take this moment to formally welcome you all to the Equestrian Transitional Council.” Twilight sat at the head of the long table in the conference room just down the hall from the South Tower. It was time for their preliminary work to begin. “This’ll be a very short meeting, I just want to give you your marching orders for the next couple days. As I told some of you on the train, your first order of business will be getting to know your ministries. I want you all to spend today and tomorrow on that, paying particular attention to what the current situation of your ministry is. The day after tomorrow, Starlight, Spike, and I will meet with all of you and you’ll give us your reports, which will tell us the gist of the national situation.”

She passed around some small notecards, on which she’d written times for each of the upcoming meetings. First, an economy meeting with Applejack, Fluttershy, and Fund Raiser. Second, public services with Fund Raiser, Rarity, and Neighsay. Third, security and law with Rainbow Dash, Spitfire, and Court Order. Fourth, foreign policy and defense with Spitfire and Pinkie Pie. Good, everything was sorted.

"Princess Twilight," Neighsay spoke up, "May I just say what an honor it is to be able to serve Equestria in these uncertain times." Court nodded in agreement.

"Thank you, Minister. It is an honor for us all." Twilight nodded back "And please, the use of my royal title will no longer be necessary."

"Ah, yes, um-" Neighsay momentarily tripped over his words, "Madame President."

“Any further questions or contributions?” The ministers all shook their heads. She dismissed them to their tasks, and then it was just her, Spike, and Starlight in the conference room as the hoofsteps and chatter faded down the hallway.

“That was all,” Twilight let out a long breath, “A lot.”

“Good speeches though.” Starlight smiled.

“Yeah, you and Princess Celestia both did amazing!” Spike held up a roll of parchment, “I wrote both down exactly, so they can be reprinted tomorrow.”

“Thank you, Spike, great work.” Twilight sank down in her chair, “I’m so tired.”

“So,” Spike hopped down from his chair, a grin on his face, “Schiltron said something about an office for ‘Mr. Spike’. I’m gonna go check it out.”

“Good idea, I should have a look at mine too, see how much sunlight the room gets. I’ve been thinking of getting a plant.” Starlight got up as well. “You coming, Twilight?”

“In a minute, you two go ahead.”

“Okay, see you in a bit.” The others left Twilight alone in the conference room. For a few minutes she just sat there, enjoying the silence. There was a pitcher of water and some cups in the middle of the table, left there for Council meetings. Some pleasant looking condensation had formed on the pitcher’s silver surface and was slowly dripping down the sides. She felt she’d been doing a lot of talking today, and her throat was starting to hurt a bit, so she slid the water over to herself and poured herself a cup. She took a sip, and stared at the wall opposite her. Her eyes caught a little streak of paint that was slightly thicker than the rest and focused on it. She took another sip of water as the ticking of the clock above the door started to echo in her head. She wanted nothing more than to be still and empty her mind, to just shrug off all her stresses and worries for a moment, but even as she stared at the paint on the wall her imagination worked at a feverish pace, showing her all the things she had ever done wrong and every little thing that could go wrong from this point forward. Her imagination was full of eyes staring at her and judging her, blaming her for their misfortunes; her friends’ eyes, her family’s eyes, her student’s eyes, her mentor’s eyes. All of them were filled with hate. Closing her own as tight as she could, she drained the rest of the water from the cup and set it on the table, then stood and headed out to the hallway to see her new office.

Coming up to the doorway with her name next to it, which was just to the left of Starlight’s, she realized that she and Spike were almost occupying the same space. His office was first, directly connected to the hall, and only by passing through it could somepony reach her. It made sense, it was the primary job of the Chief of Staff to be a sort of liaison between an authority and the outside world. She entered to find Spike standing on his chair, arranging some standard office decor on his desk; he must have seen a photo in an issue of Manehattan Business Quarterly or something and decided that was the epitome of style and professionalism. He even had a Newton’s Cradle sitting in one corner. Her face couldn’t help but light up watching him put everything together just right. Whatever made him happy, she thought. He turned around at the sound of her hoofsteps.

“Oh, hey, Twilight!” He hopped up on top of the desk now, “Come to check out our sweet new digs?”

“Yeah, thought I should have a look too.” She glanced around the room. Spike’s office was a moderate size, larger than she would have thought a little dragon like him would need, but as she noticed the chairs by the wall she realized it served a dual purpose; those who wanted to meet with her would queue in here, waiting for their turns. The walls were white stone, like the rest of the castle, and a window behind the desk let in some nice natural light. The desk and chair themselves were fairly small, but they would suit Spike well, and he had already amassed an impressive armada of quills, ink, and parchment, anticipating the work to come. Walking past his desk, she stuck her head through the doorway to her own office. It was much the same but felt smaller, probably owing to a sizable portion of one wall being taken up by a large bookcase. She didn’t know the identity of this office’s previous inhabitant, but they had left a substantial collection of reading material as their legacy, and from what she could see they had pretty damn good taste. I mean, Starswirl’s Living Magic: Risks and Rewards and Gratius Magnus’ Autocracy on the same shelf? Score! She pulled them both down from the shelf and placed them on her desk, which, she noticed, was the same as Spike’s, for later. She drew back the curtains hanging from the back wall, revealing a floor to ceiling, wall to wall window that looked over the castle gardens; very nice indeed.

“So, what do you think?” Spike appeared in the doorway.

“I love it, this is incredible.”

“Yeah, I can see you’re already drooling over the books.” He smirked, “Wasn’t expecting this kinda setup in particular though. What am I, your secretary?”

“I guess that’s one way to think of it, but the Chief of Staff position is so much more. It’s not like you’ll just be making me coffee or anything like that.” Twilight recalled her earlier thoughts, “You’re the link between me and the outside world. Ponies come to you with issues, and you decide what needs my attention. You help me with communications, organization, administration, all sorts of things! It’s a huge responsibility.”

“Wow, it almost sounds… important.” His expression gradually shifted from awe to excitement, “I get to do something important!”

“Yes, very important. Just don’t, y’know, do anything like you did at the Grand Equestria Pony Summit, okay?”

“Don’t worry, I learned my lesson. I won’t let you down!” He gave her a snappy salute.

“Thank you, Spike. That’s why you’ll always be my number one assistant.”

“Got any work for me to do?”

“Have you sent out your copy of the speeches for reprinting?”

“Yep, already done!”

“Alright, then for now all I need you to do is keep an eye out for letters from the political parties. They’ll probably be sending them anytime now, requesting to be part of the constitutional committee.”

“Got it, I’ll let you know when they show up.”

“Thank you.” She gave him a gentle pat on the head, “I’m gonna go check on Starlight, I’ll see you a bit later.”

“Okay, I’ll just finish getting all my professional business things in order.” He returned to his desk with an exaggerated swagger as Twilight left the room and walked the few steps to the office next door.

“Hi, Starlight!” She knocked on the doorway. The room was much the same as hers, but the desk was in a different place and a painting of kites hung from the wall opposite it.

“Hey,” Her student-turned-Vice President was standing by the window, working on positioning a small table, “What do you think of a plant, say, right here?” She nudged the table a quarter-inch to the left.

“I think that’s a great idea, it’ll really bring some lovely natural feel to the room. Why not on your desk though?”

“Well, I didn’t want the desk to have its back to the window,” Starlight gestured to her desk, which had its back to the right wall of the room and was now perpendicular to the window, “Because then anypony I was talking to would have the sun in their eyes.”

“Oh, right.” Twilight considered moving her own desk.

“But then I was worried that if I put a plant on it the poor thing wouldn’t get enough sunlight, so I brought the nightstand down from my room to put by the window.”

“So where is your lucky chlorophyll filled friend?”

“Oh, I don’t have it yet, I just wanted to make sure everything was ready. I’m so excited! Having another living thing to take care of, so small, so cute, so defenseless, it really makes you feel like you’ve got your life together, y’know?”

“Uh, yeah, I guess.” She wondered if Spike counted.

“I wonder if this is how parents feel. I’m gonna name her Phyllis.” Starlight beamed.

“Riiiiight. Have you ever thought about getting a pet?”

“Yeah, but I don’t know if I trust myself that much, I feel like I’d mess it up somehow. Better to start off safe.”

“Hey, you know what they say, always know your limits.”

“Mhm.” Starlight took a seat on top of her desk, “Got any work for me?”

“Not at the moment. Just keep an eye on the others, make sure they’re adapting okay, and let me know if you think anypony needs any help.”

“Alright, if I notice anything you’ll be the first to know.”

“Good, thank you.” Twilight turned to go, then looked back, “Oh, and Starlight?”

“Yeah?”

“Let me know if you need anything too, okay? I’m here for you.”

“Right back ‘atcha, Madame President.” Her student gave her a smile as she left the room.

The rest of the day passed uneventfully. She spent most of it in her office, finishing getting all her things together and in their proper places, and then reading Living Magic. She’d been intending to read Autocracy first, but the lure of one of Starswirl’s classics was too strong to ignore, and it hadn’t been entirely irrelevant to her new position. There were several fascinating chapters on the Equestrian legal code, which, she learned, was not simply a document but a powerful living spell which enforced itself by influencing ponies’ minds. Creepy, certainly, but also apparently effective, though not without its limitations. The intense magic involved in holding the whole thing together greatly limited its scope and meant it was more a short set of commandments than an extensive anthology of law; don’t harm, don’t steal, etc. The other issue was that if a violator felt strongly enough that their actions were justified, the spell would have no effect on them. Hardly an effective manner of enforcement, she thought, but it seemed to have been enough to maintain basic harmony until recently. That was why, she supposed, there was no substantial Equestrian state security sector.

Twilight lifted a nearby mug to her lips and swallowed a mouthful of warm, unsweetened Earl Gray. The drawbacks of the living magic legal code were certainly problematic. Why had Celestia never devised a more extensive set of laws that could be more widely or conventionally enforced? She made a mental note to ask the princess about that sometime. Obviously the code was of no use in cases of civil unrest, the wild protests had been enough evidence of that. She would need to work with Court and Rainbow to see if there were better options. It was during this momentary pause in her ferocious consumption of knowledge that the exhaustion began to set in again. It was late, and she’d barely eaten a thing all day, but she wasn’t really that hungry anyway; just tired. Should she go to bed? Maybe after a few more pages. As she looked back down at the book, her vision blurred and she swayed a little in her chair. Nope, time for bed. With a yawn, a stretch, and some cracking of joints, she stood and made her way up the stairs of the South Tower. When she reached the top she saw the door to the balcony was open, and found Spike sitting outside.

“Hey Spike, whatcha doing?” She sat down next to him.

“Just stargazing.” His gaze was fixed upwards, “They look different here, you ever notice that? They’re dimmer than the ones in Ponyville, like that was always meant to be our real home; our real night sky.”

“Light pollution.” Twilight yawned again.

“What?”

“It’s light pollution. Canterlot produces more artificial light during nighttime, so it makes the stars look dimmer.”

“You're no fun.” He crossed his arms and scowled at her, and she giggled guiltily and gave him a sheepish look.

“Sorry. I didn’t mean to ruin the moment.”

“It’s okay.” He sighed, “It’s just weird being back in Canterlot. It doesn’t feel the same as before, and I miss Ponyville.”

“Me too.” She reached out and put a foreleg around Spike, pulling him close to her, “We may have been born here, but Ponyville’s our home. It’ll be okay, we’ll be back there before we know it, and then we can be in Ponyville as long as we want. The length of time we’ll be here is a small fraction of the rest of our lives.”

“I guess that’s a good way of looking at it.” Spike leaned into Twilight’s fur, “Twilight?”

“Yeah?”

“Are we always gonna be together?”

“Of course we are. I’ll always be there to take care of you, Spike.”

“I wanna do the same for you.”

“You already do, you do so much for me. I have no idea what I would do without you.” She hugged him tightly, “You’re part of my family, Spike. You always have been; I hope you know that.”

“Don’t worry, I know.” He hugged her back. They sat there for a few minutes in silence, just looking up at the night sky.

“We’ve come a long way, haven’t we?” Twilight said without looking down.

“Yeah. I can’t wait for the rest of it.”

“Me neither.” Her assistant let out a loud yawn. “Tired?”

“Uh huh. I’m gonna go get some sleep.”

“Alright, see you in the morning, Spike. Sleep well.”

“You too.” He headed back inside and shut the door behind him. Twilight stayed out on the balcony, enjoying the cool air, breathing deeply and letting it fill her lungs. She laid her chin on the railing and rested her head there, then shut her eyes, just listening to the sounds of the city at night. She sniffed a little, thinking there was something off about what she was smelling. An acrid scent drifted up from below and began to fill her nostrils. Twilight’s eyes opened slowly, and she beheld a city in flames. Fire poured from the broken windows of looted homes and shops, battered and splintered barricades could be seen at doorways and intersections, and the streets ran red. She could hear the sounds of shouting and fighting from a ways off, and see shadowy figures moving in the flickering firelight, some of which appeared to be armed with various improvised weapons. She looked up, and saw a tattered tri-color flag flying from the top of the castle’s tallest tower. There was a feeling lingering in her, creeping around the edges of her mind, that this was all her fault, all because she had failed. Yet she felt oddly at peace with the world.

“A dismal sight, is it not?” Luna’s voice came from her right. The Princess of the Night was sitting beside her, also looking over Equestria’s burning capital.

“Princess Luna? Oh,” Twilight quickly realized the circumstances, “I’m asleep. This isn’t real.”

“Indeed. But it is quite the nightmare.”

“It’s just a dream.”

“Some say the seeds of the future can be found in dreams.”

“This will never happen in Equestria. Not on my watch.”

“So confident. You must be on guard. Our land is under constant threat, and only unerring vigilance can protect it.”

“Threats from where? The Changelings are no longer our enemies, Tirek is imprisoned, Discord is reformed-”

“The greatest danger always comes from within.”

“Do you mean the reformists, or something else?”

“Perhaps both. Certainly those rabble rousers are dangerous, but I would also be wary of my sister if I were you.”

“Princess Celestia would never do anything to hurt her ponies.”

“Not if she was in her right mind, no.”

“Wait, what do you know? What’s wrong with her?”

“She has taken the displeasure of our subjects quite personally, I am afraid. She does not discuss it with me, but after all the long years we have spent together I know her better than anypony, and I can read her well. She feels neglected, disrespected, unloved, thankless… it reminds me all too much of myself, before my fall to evil and disharmony.”

“You think the same might happen to her? That she could become like Nightmare Moon?”

“Perhaps, if something is not done to arrest her descent. You should be cautious in her presence, and mind what you say and do.”

“I will. Thank you for the warn-”

“That is not all. You wield a great deal of power now, especially for one so young and inexperienced. You will be tested, frustrated, time and time again. You will long for an easy path, to simply force aside those who oppose you with the vast strength of the state. I understand that desire quite well. Take care to not become dangerous yourself. Sometimes the greatest threats to a nation are those who seek to protect it.”

“Princess Luna, anything I do, I will do for the good of Equestria. That is a promise.”

“The road to Tartarus is paved with good intentions, Twilight Sparkle. Know this; I may have failed my land and subjects in the past, but,” Luna fixed her eyes on Twilight’s, the deepest reaches of them burning like cold, black fires, “I will not allow anything or anypony to threaten Equestria again while I live. Not outsiders, not traitors, not my sister, and not you.”

At Luna’s last words of warning, Twilight’s eyes snapped open. She was still on the balcony, her chin resting on the railing, and Canterlot spread below her like a vast tapestry of brick and mortar. There were, she noted with relief, no fires, no rioters, no barricades, and no revolutionary tri-color flying over the castle. Luna’s threat echoed in her head; not outsiders, not traitors, not my sister, and not you. She would need to tread carefully around both sisters, it would seem, and she urgently needed to talk to Celestia. If Luna was right, and Celestia really was taking things so badly, she had to do something to help her teacher, and not just to stop her going down the same dark path as her sister. Celestia had given her everything she had, and she would return that same kindness tenfold, even if it took her whole life. Besides, she thought with a sinking heart, she was the one who told Celestia to give in to the protesters; maybe it was her fault in the first place. Maybe she’d already totally screwed something up. A feeling of anxiety still gnawing at her chest, she silently crept back into the room, so as not to wake Spike, and lay down. She tossed and turned, but sleep wouldn’t come; all there was was the monotonous ticking of the clock as she ran through every single disaster scenario her imagination could conjure, over and over again, until the early hours of the morning.

Author's Note

Edit 5/25/2021: Just a few minor changes.