Biological Clockby Hasty RevisionChaptersChapter 1Chapter 2Chapter 3Chapter 1Celestia had unfortunate effects on the nerves of most ponies, even five years into retirement, but medical professionals got it worst. Something about confronting the idea of her having imperfect health made things so much more difficult for them than for spa workers or waiters. Doctor Flowering Branch was doing pretty well so far in Celestia's estimation. Better than the nurses and receptionist had done, certainly. Dr. Branch's ocean blue mane wasn't frizzed from panic, and she hadn't sweat through either her seafoam fur coat or her white cloth one. Which wasn't to say she that wasn't cowering on the other side of her desk like a foal facing a reprimand from her principal. “Please, have a seat, er, your Majesty?” Celestia offered a gracious smile to the doctor that would hopefully offset any awkwardness that her decision to sit down on the floor between the two guest chairs might cause. Cozy as this particular doctor's office was, the chairs were severely undersized for her frame. The doctor cringed but, encouragingly, didn't whimper in despair or babble about back-orders like the poor mare in the lobby had. It was hardly their faults, but saying anything, no matter how kindly, would only throw it into sharper relief. Yes, most places in Canterlot went out of their way to make sure they had something on hoof for her. And, yes, sitting on the floor was hardly the most comfortable way to conduct a meeting. But after a thousand years of apparent chastity and abstinence, any fair minded pony ought to be able to forgive a fertility specialist for not expecting her, of all ponies, to make an appointment. Better to change the topic entirely. Try to make the mare more comfortable by setting a ground rule for her to hold onto. The title, perhaps. Getting anypony to simply call her “Celestia” was still like pulling cragadile teeth, but they should all know that Twilight and Cadance were the “Majesties” by now. Every little bit of reinforcement in that direction helped. “Please, you don't have to call me that anymore, Doctor Branch. I'm just Celestia now. Or 'Princess', if you'd prefer.” “Oh, er, yes.” A fraction of Dr. Branch's tension bled away to make room for an equal measure of a doctor's confidence. “Of course, er, Princess. Is there anything you'd like before we get started?” Celestia's smile broadened ever so slightly. Gotcha. “No, thank you. I'm quite eager to hear your thoughts on my issue.” To her credit, the doctor didn't blush at the prospect, instead drawing on a little more of her reserves of professionalism. “Of course, Princess. I've… ahem, I've had a look at your file, and your description of the problem. And, well…” Celestia's smile growth neatly reversed itself. Dr. Branch looked uncomfortable as she shuffled her papers into some sort of order with her magic. Uncomfortable in a far more professional sense than before. Then again, she'd never actually gotten “bad news” from a doctor before. Not for herself. Perhaps she was making a maulwurf out of a mole. Dr. Branch eventually set the papers down in a neat stack and looked up. “I have a few questions I'd like to ask you to help me narrow things down.” “Of course.” “With regard to your age. Er, I know that our standard form only gave you three digits to work with. Could you give me a more precise value?” “How precise do you need?” “Er,” Dr. Branch rubbed a hoof against her opposing leg. “Within a decade? If you can?” Celestia nodded. “I believe I am somewhere in my 1,170's. Probably between 1,172 and 1,174.” “You're not certain?” “It was somewhat difficult to keep track of time during Discord's reign. It's one of the reasons I eventually reset the calendar entirely.” The doctor's eyes and mouth both went round for a moment before she caught herself. “Yes. Yes, well, that's certainly close enough to help.” “I'm aware that age plays a role in fertility, but I've not changed significantly since my late twenties. Every other medical examination I've had has remarked on that.” “Er, yes. Yes! Yes, that was all in-- in your file, yes.” Too much. She'd probably come across as questioning her expertise rather than… what had she meant by that? Looking back, that'd almost sounded defensive. Dr. Branch was cringing again and those files had to be completely out of order by now. Celestia straightened up. This would not do. She was here to be told not to tell. “Doctor, I must confess something to you: I'm not very well versed in medicine.” The doctor rocked back in her seat, shocked by her bluntness, no doubt. “I'm somewhat behind the times in a great deal of scientific knowledge, in fact. I've always made sure to surround myself with knowledgeable ponies to help me manage policy, as there was never enough time for me to learn it all for myself, but that has never been more necessary than in the last century. I've come here for much the same reason. If I make any wrong-headed assumptions, please, do not hesitate to correct me, and certainly don't take my word as the final one.” She swallowed. Would it be too much to say more? The doctor still looked nervous, but a more personal plea might make her uncomfortable. Then again… Branch was a doctor in a very personal field. It might be what she was used to. She ducked her head slightly. “This is important to me, doctor. I don't want to miss out on this because I'm doing something wrong. If you think my age is important then, please, ask your next question.” Dr. Branch glanced down at her files, then back up to Celestia. “I'm not sure, Princess, but most of the patients I see who are having this much difficulty conceiving have something conspicuous in their medical history. An injury, a past bout of a disease that can impact fertility, symptoms of a hormone imbalance, something like that. Your age is the thing that leaps out at me as the one thing you don't have in common with most mares. Er,” a slight pink tinge crept into her cheeks, “besides your size, I mean. And, er…” Celestia's smile came back, just a little. “Being an alicorn?” “Er, yes. But with Princess Cadenza's success in mind, I really think we should start with your age. I have a few questions that weren't covered by the, er, volumes of your older medical history that I could get my hooves on, if that's alright?” “Ask anything you like.” “Have you… ever tried before?” “No.” Branch's eyebrows shot up. “Never?” “Never intentionally. I… did have a close call once. An accident, if you will. But nothing came of it.” “How long ago was this?” “Five hundred forty nine years ago. I remember the date quite clearly,” she added in answer to the doctor's obvious incredulity. “For better or worse, it was a memorable event.” The doctor visibly went back and forth with herself, then shook her head and set her jaw with determination. “Forgive me, Princess, but I'm afraid I'm going to have to be very direct with you about this if we're going to get anywhere.” Here we go. Much better. “Please.” “How long have you suspected that you've had a fertility problem?” “Just in the last two years.” “You had no reason to suspect anything during the last millennium?” “No, I did not.” “…How?” “A solemn vow. One that I finally fulfilled five years ago. And one that I only failed to uphold on a single night, five hundred forty nine years ago.” Branch's ears drooped. “Oh. And… after that night?” “I made use of what options were available at the time to prevent a pregnancy and counted my blessings when my next cycle hit.” Like a train, as she recalled. Not that they'd been invented yet. It was as if her body decided she needed to be punished for her indiscretion in the pettiest way possible. “I-- I cannot even imagine the self control you must have.” Celestia chuckled. “Oh, you get used to it. I hardly ever thought about it anymore after the first few hundred years.” Branch snorted. “I didn't make it to twenty!” Celestia perked up. “You have children?” And there was the blush. Hesitantly, Branch turned a picture frame on her desk around in her magic. A little photograph of herself snuggled against a rather charming looking pegasus stallion, surrounded by five adorable colts and fillies ranging from foal to preteen. “Oh, my. I see I came to the right doctor.” The photo whipped back around, much to Celestia's amusement, while the doctor tried her best to get her decorum back. Gotcha again! “Anyway. About your cycle. Have you noticed anything unusual about it? Late or early starts, missed cycles, extreme variations in intensity?” “All three. I've always been irregular. My past doctors put it down to stress, but I haven't looked into it any further than that until now.” “Always?” Branch looked her straight in the eye, all business once more. She really was handling herself quite well. Luna's recommendation was looking better by the minute. “Are you sure?” The word 'yes' was on the tip of Celestia's tongue when it paused at the jump. She had been, hadn't she? Stress was a very well known cause for such problems, even back when she was up to date on medicine, and she'd always had a stressful life. But then again… For all the irritation that a mare's cycle could bring, it was a routine irritation. Memory filtered routine like ears filtered the background noise of a busy city, and it was so very long ago. But surely she could recall her first time going through it? Luna would still have been a filly at the time, of course, but when she was older… “No. I don't think I am. I… No,” she said, more firmly than before. “I was regular at first. My sister and I would always hit ours at nearly the same time, living together like we did. Then, after she was gone, I-- I stayed mostly regular. I was under a lot of stress at the time, but I leveled out after a few years.” “When did that change?” Celestia's wings ruffled. When? It must have been centuries ago for her to have so fully forgotten. “I want to say… in my sixties? No, seventies? I'm sorry, but I just don't remember.” “That's alright, Princess. That's close enough.” “Is it important?” “Maybe.” Papers rearranged again; Celestia was starting to suspect a nervous tick on Branch's part, but this time seemed a touch more purposeful. “I know I saw it in here… aha! Here we are!” A single page leaped triumphantly above the rest. “Let me see… it says here that you use a few prescription grooming products for ponies with excessive shedding?” At last it was Celestia's turn to flush. “Ah, yes. I have quite a bit more fur to manage than the average mare, and my mane and tail can be rather troublesome at times.” Branch's smile was warm and reassuring. “I understand, Princess. I never would have guessed if it wasn't in your files. You also molt your feathers, yes? And have to keep your hooves trimmed?” Celestia nodded to both. Branch slumped as if a great weight had just landed on her back. “I was afraid of that.” These were rather odd questions. The excessive shedding she could understand perhaps being a sign of an underlying hormonal problem for anypony else. But molting? Not excessive or irregular molting, but simply molting, period? And hoof trimming? What was the connection? “I don't wish to question your expertise, again I'm not well versed in this area, but how are my hooves and feathers related to my fertility?” “What you've told me is that your body is still… aging, in a way,” Branch told her desk. “Your feathers and the hairs of your coat are still growing, wearing out, and getting replaced, which suggests that your biological processes are running at the same rate as any other pony. If that's true, then… I think I know where to start.” A cold knot balled up deep in Celestia's stomach. She couldn't mean-- no, no the math didn't work out. She was no doctor but she wasn't ignorant. “I know a mare is born with all of her eggs already formed, but we have many hundreds of thousands of them, don't we? I couldn't have-- surely I still-- I mean, I'm not that old!” Branch's hoof pushed a sheet of paper a little to the left, her eyes staying resolutely down and away from Celestia's while she answered. “The actual number can vary anywhere from the tens of thousands to the millions, but the average mare is in the range of five or six hundred thousand at birth. One is released per cycle so you'd expect a mare to still have hundreds of thousands by the time she hits middle age. But… that's not how it works out. “You see, for every egg released, many more just… die. The average mare might only have a thousand eggs left by the time she reaches the end of her foaling years. Maybe less. Every medical metric we have says that you're a mare in her late twenties or early thirties, but I don't know why or how you've stayed that way. If your cells are still aging and dying at anything close to a normal rate like it seems, and your apparent overall age is because your body is just really good at replacing them, then I'm afraid that--” “How do we find out?” Celestia rasped. Branch's head ducked lower, ears pinned back hard. “There's a test. We--” “When?” “I ordered the lab to start setting up as soon as you arrived. They should be ready for us by now.” Celestia's knotted stomach followed the rest of her to her hooves under strenuous protest. “Lead the way.” Chapter 2The sound of wingbeats drew Luna to the front window like a filly to a plate of cookies. That it turned out to be the mail delivery made her wilt like a filly who discovered those same cookies were unsweetened licorice snaps. She ducked away from the blinds and looked to the treacherous clock. She could swear that Discord was sneaking in backward ticks when she wasn't looking. It was well and truly impossible for it to have only been five minutes since the last time she'd checked. “What is taking you so long?” She had been assured that Celestia's first visit to the clinic would be only an hour or two at most. Dr. Branch had come highly recommended to her by one of her own guards. A miracle worker, that was what she'd been promised. And that was what she, in turn, had promised Celestia. “It only took my wife two hours,” Nightwatch had told her. “A few questions and some bloodwork was all the doctor needed to figure everything out.” They'd had foal number two on the way even as Celestia's negative tests piled up. She picked up her pacing once more. The doctors would help her sister. Modern medicine was nothing but miracles! Why anypony would resist visiting such skilled healers she could only imagine came down to lack of perspective. A perspective that her sister ought to have had, and yet it'd taken twisting all four of her legs to get her to go. Surely she could see that these modern healers were nothing like the ones of their youth? Those blustering fools took Meadowbrook's disappearance as an excuse to turn back nearly two decades of progress out of blind spite for her brilliance. That her cure for Swamp Fever had ever been lost was a travesty. Luna knew things were different, for not once since her return, not once, had she been prescribed a leeching. Long had she suspected that the principal benefit of leeches was to steer the patient's complaints away from their illness and towards the leeches, thus giving them an ailment the self-important quacks could legitimately claim to know how to solve. For every healer applying useful cures back in her youth, there were a dozen with family in the leech farming business. The world was well rid of such nonsense now, and better for it! Unless Celestia knew something she didn't? What if Celestia had a good reason to resist visiting a fertility clinic? What if she'd lead Celestia astray? What if they couldn't help her? What if she'd gotten her hopes up for nothing after she'd already waited for so long? What if that was--? Luna stopped in her tracks and shook her head hard. “Enough of this! It will be fine! Celestia will be fine! It's not your faul--” she took a deep breath, “it's not my fault. She was merely… busy. She was just too busy to have foals all that time. She said so herself.” She glanced up at the clock. Three minutes this time. Liar. “Celestia wouldn't lie though. Not about that. It will all be fine.” She assumed her most royal posture before her audience of overstuffed lounge furniture. “All shall be well! Celestia will return with good news, and we shall celebrate the coming of a new niece or nephew. Then there shall be two royal foals, and the doting shall be doubled!” Her royal facade crumbled slightly. “Except that Celestia will be too busy with her own child to join me in my visits to Flurry. Celestia always sets our agenda when we foalsit for Cadance and Shining Armor. What would I even do with Flurry without her--” her expression turned to horror, “I'll have to foalsit for Celestia. She'll leave her own child in my hooves whenever she gallivants off on one of her thrill-seeking romps with Twilight Velvet. She certainly can't take a foal rappelling down the Abysmal Abyss with them, or whatever other mad idea they think of next.” Luna's pacing began anew, back and forth between the sofa and the open doorway to the kitchen. “Will I have to move out? She and the foal will need space; I can't always be hovering around while Celestia is mothering her foal! I'll be an intruder, a-- a third wheel! I'll need to find my own place. Is the other side of town far enough or should I move to another city? I've never lived alone before! I-- I--” A deep shiver stopped her in her tracks. Her next words shook in her suddenly arid throat. “I've never lived alone before.” Outside the sisters' house, two lightly armored royal guards stood at uneasy attention at either side of the front door, made uneasy by the muffled ranting just audible through the bay window on the front wall. The more junior guard, a pegasus stallion, flinched at the sound of some piece of furniture being violently disturbed. “Should we, uh, do something?” His more senior unicorn comrade shook his head. Another heavy thump rattled the window along with a muted expletive. “Are you sure?” “This is normal.” A duller third thump came just before a louder second expletive. “She gets like this whenever Princess Celestia goes anywhere new without her since they retired. She'll calm down soon.” The confidence of his voice was only somewhat belied by a wary twitch of his ear. “Probably.” A new, more rhythmic series of thuds suspiciously akin to what a larger than average head might make when thumped upon a coffee table didn't do the younger guard's nerves any favors. “Will she be okay?” “Just keep watching for paparazzi, Private. Anything else about these two is out of our league.” Luna let herself slump over the coffee table from her decidedly un-regal seat on the carpet. She was being ridiculous, of course she was being ridiculous. Celestia wasn't going to notice that she'd kicked an end table out of place. Even if she had, she wouldn't have made an issue out of it. She wouldn't have gotten worried or questioned if she was okay or needed help or any of the other thousand things she was afraid of, so panicking as she had was completely absurd. She might notice the new horn-gouges in the coffee table, but who was counting by this point? Wandering eyes landing on the clock told her that it has been six minutes this time. Six miserable little minutes. Minutes which she'd been promised were so close in length to those told by the minute glasses of yesteryear as to be indistinguishable. She wished to believe otherwise. She'd rather believe that time was a flexible, mutable thing that sought to twist itself into knots for the pleasure of torturing ponies who had something to wait for. That would give her anything to blame but herself for her misery. “Where are you? What is taking so long?” As much as she resented the doctors of the past, it wasn't the leeches behind the specter of dread clawing at the back of her neck. That stemmed from the other sort of doctor's prescription. The kind that even the kindest and most reputable of doctors from her youth would give far too often: try to make her comfortable. Being given leeches meant that the doctor thought that treatment was an option. So many ponies never had that option. Even modern doctors would sometimes face the grim reality that comfort was all they would be able to offer. But it couldn't be bad news. Celestia's health was impeccable. She hadn't aged a day in the past thousand years. Years spent in the care of ponies who would sooner feast on salads of poison joke and thistles than let her fall into ill health. Then again… she wasn't quite as she'd used to be, was she? Her strength and stamina were certainly not what they once were, but that was plainly a lack of exercise. That she'd maintained any measure of fitness after a millennium of sedentary political life was proof itself of her strong constitution! “She'll be fine. She'll return any minute now with nothing but good news. Perhaps she's… stopped to grab a treat, to celebrate! A cake, or-- or a--” The front door unlatched. “Luna! I'm home!” Luna scrambled off the floor to meet her sister in the front hall just as the door shut again. “Celestia! Where have… you…?” That… was a great deal of food. A great deal. Bulging bags of every sweet, starchy, or otherwise decadent thing the pair of them ever ate, all crammed into the negative space around her sister. Even more of ingredients for favorite dishes, and multiple boxes bearing the branding of local bakeries, candy makers, and at least two pizzerias. That her sister was within the swarm was an educated guess best supported by the sunny yellow magic holding it all having to come from somewhere. “Oh, don't mind me, just a few groceries.” The wall of edibles advanced like a pantry avalanche. A pizza box departed the flock to hover under Luna's nose, or close enough for a mare whose view was mostly blocked by baguettes. “Here! Three-mushroom and three cheese with olives. Please, help yourself while I put this all away.” Luna took hold of the box with her magic more out of reflex than any understanding of what was happening. Her attention stayed on the floating grocery store as it blindly negotiated its way around the doorway into the kitchen. Outlying bags bumped against the frame to be dragged through behind the rest of the swarm in its passing. Only once her sister's entourage was out of sight did Luna jar herself back into action to follow in stunned silence. The gnawing ache in the pit of her stomach had very little to do with her appetite. “What do you think, Luna? Scalloped potatoes tonight?” Five pounds worth of potatoes rose into an indecisive hover over the main island counter where Luna sat with her half-eaten pizza. Appetite, it transpired, returned quickly enough when duly provoked after a skipped lunch. “Do you prefer skins on or off?” “Either way is fine. How was the doctor's visit?” Celestia started to weave the potatoes through the floating obstacle course of food she'd yet to put away that still hovered around her. Plenty of it already occupied the available counter space along the wall and the island, and more had been stowed away in the walk-in pantry and both refrigerators. Luna didn't know if she should be glad they'd gotten a kitchen big enough to keep up with her sister, or resent its size for enabling her. “Skin on it is. Potatoes are nothing but starch otherwise.” “Most of this proposed dinner is nothing but starch.” Luna hefted another sloppy slice of thoroughly cheesed pizza in her magic. “The rest is oil or sugar.” “Oh, don't exaggerate,” Celestia scoffed. “Hmm… strawberry cheesecake for dessert tonight or the Germane chocolate cake?” “Either. Now, about the doctor--” Both cakes whizzed past on the way to the refrigerator. “I suppose we can pick when we get there! Let me see, where should I put these bananas? I was thinking of making banana bread this weekend, they ought to be just ripe enough by then. Oh, where is the ice cream? That needs to go away before it melts.” Luna took a grumpy bite of pizza to stifle her own grumbling. It was bad enough that her sister had made her sit in worry for hours upon hours just so that she could buy enough food to sate a gang of adolescent dragons for her to hide behind, but to blithely ignore her and talk over her? It was only marginally less insulting than outright lying. Celestia was good at hiding her thoughts, but not her feelings. Never her feelings. Not even a thousand years of practice could stop it all being right there in her eyes. That, presumably, was why Celestia refused to look at her. “I picked up some of that sourdough you like as well.” “Celestia.” Potatoes thudded into the sink. “Ugh, really, Luna. It was a doctor's visit. Lots of questions, cold implements, and undersized furniture. Now, do you see the ice cream anywhere or not?” “You put it away five minutes ago.” Celestia paused mid step. She cast her eyes about the groceries still scattered about the air and countertops and everywhere that wasn't Luna, before hesitantly asking, “are you sure?” “It went in the left refrigerator after the eggs, milk, and brie, but before the puff pastry, mozzarella, and root beer.” Celestia shook off her moment of uncertainty and beamed a smile in no particular direction. “Ah! Of course. Have you ever tried a root beer float? I thought we could have some on the deck tomorrow while we grill up the carrots. The weather scheduled is perfect for a little cookout. I can make that potato salad we had last month that you liked.” Luna threw down her crust. “That is enough, sister. Out with it!” The groceries closed ranks around Celestia, particularly around her face. “I… don't know what you mean.” “You're hiding something, and I want to know what it is. Need I remind you what happens when we are not honest with one another?” “I'm not hiding--” “That's IT!” Luna kicked away her stool and stormed around the island towards her backpedaling sister, who made the unfortunate tactical blunder of letting herself get backed into the pantry. “I will tolerate your evasions.” Her aura lanced through her sister's to tug the groceries from her grasp. “And I will tolerate your diversions.” She set it all aside, jamming it in wherever it'd fit and leaving nothing for Celestia to cower behind but her own mane. “I will even tolerate being told that something is not my business.” Celestia's tail bumped into the shelves of dry goods at the back of the pantry. “But you will NOT lie to me!” Luna glared up at her sister who still kept her face turned safely away behind the curtain of her mane. Rare though it was for anypony to challenge Celestia so directly, Luna had enjoyed the privilege enough times to imagine the expressions warring across her visage as the seconds ticked by. Luna didn't need for Celestia to turn her head to know the look of abject defeat that must have settled into her eyes when she finally sat down upon the hardwood floor. “What if,” Celestia cleared her throat of the terrible rasp those words came with, “what if I said it wasn't your business now?” “The contents of your movable feast tell a much different story.” Celestia's head came up just enough for one eye to glance around at the now haphazardly stocked shelves around them. “I eat when I'm upset, I admit that. But--” “You eat when you're frustrated. You cook when you're upset. You cook for others when you're upset for them.” A loaf of hearty, crusty bread floated between them. “You hate sourdough, sister. You bought it because you know that I love it.” The loaf found its place in the general vicinity of the other breads. “You've brought home just about every food that I've told you I liked since my return, on top of what few remain from the old days. Your plan, so far as I can see, is to stuff me with food until I am no longer able to walk under my own power. What am I to imagine this means, sister?” Celestia's neck drooped until her mane spilled over her face entirely once more. “I… can't.” Luna snorted and scuffed the floor hard enough to scratch the tiles. “You cannot say. You have spent two years fixated on this matter, talking my ears off about it at every opportunity. All those late evenings spent designing and redesigning your dream nursery. A list of foals names longer than a full-grown sea serpent, and now you have nothing left to say on the matter? Can you imagine for one moment how frightened I am right now, sister?” Celestia cringed. “Have you any idea how it feels to see you return from a doctor in such a state? Have you forgotten what such a thing used to mean?” “I can't,” Celestia whispered, almost pleading. “Luna, I can't.” “Why! Why can't you tell me? Why…” Too late Luna saw how Celestia was shivering. How her wings were clamped tight to sides that shuddered with suppressed sobs. And how the tiny puddles of water at her forehooves accumulated drop by drop. “I am telling you, Luna.” Luna tore her eyes off the teardrops. “I don't understand.” “The doctor told me that I'm… I'm in 'perfect' health. I have the body of a twenty-five year old mare, and that's the only thing wrong with me.” Luna's brow furrowed deeply. That wasn't a joke. It ought to have been a joke; Celestia had made such jokes after routine (and thoroughly unnecessary) doctor's visits before. 'Setting a good example', she called them, and Luna had seen the wisdom of it after her first encounter with a newspaper. But those good-natured japes were delivered with the effortless humor of a mare untouchable. There was no humor in her now. “What do you mean? Please, speak plainly, sister.” Celestia sniffed and dabbed at her eyes beneath the veil of her mane. “I'm old, Luna. I'm so old, but my body thinks I'm still so young. Every cycle goes wrong, but my magic says that everything is fine and to keep trying. So it just keeps trying over and over again. For a thousand years my body has been telling me that there was still a chance. That it wasn't already too late.” Luna was not as ignorant of the modern era as once she'd been, owing to many hours of devoted study in the royal libraries. One particularly awkward tome represented society's best attempt to explain the miracle of foaling to the common pony without using any of the dozens of words that would have done the job in moments. The common pony knew just enough for the bottom drop to out of her stomach a mere moment before Celestia gave her condition a name. Had the blow been delivered by one of the Crystal Empire's champion jousters it could not have struck so true. “I'm sterile, Luna. I've been sterile for over nine-hundred years.” Chapter 3Conventional wisdom held that the anticipation of a dreaded event was often worse than the event itself. Long experience had taught Celestia that, while this was true more often than not, the exceptions to that rule were often the cruelest of all. No amount of dreadful anticipation could be worse than the actual moment when a mare watched her little sister's heart break. Luna liked to poke fun at her for her constant redesigns, or fawning over names, or any of the other silly things she'd gotten up to since deciding to try for a foal. Yet several sketches of cribs and mobiles bore her signature. Dozens upon dozens of names on the overlong list were written in her elegant, looping script. And countless nursery designs featured her glittering constellations on the ceiling. The sadness for a dream lost was awful to see. The moment when sadness turned to guilt and shame was so much worse. “Luna, it's--” “It's not my fault.” Luna took a step back. “It's not.” A tentative flicker of hope caught light in Celestia's chest. “No, of course it's not.” “You were busy.” “That's right.” “Leading Equestria alone was hard work.” “Yes, it was.” “And if I'd been there--” “It wouldn't have changed that,” Celestia declared. “A child takes so much time and devotion. Single parents with ordinary jobs already struggle to strike the right balance. Even together, leading Equestria was no ordinary job.” “Cadance-” “Has a husband, and in-laws, and friends all ready to help, and fewer citizens to look after than the mayor of Manehatten.” Celestia rose to her hooves and took a tentative step closer. “Could you imagine me asking Twilight to foalsit for me ten years ago? I might have lost her to a heart attack on the spot!” That didn't get the smile she'd hoped for. Luna's eyes were downcast, yet darted back and forth as if searching for some revelation from the floorboards. Her ears flitted between drooping and pinning back as each new thought set her mood spiraling in some horrible new direction. She needed to be snapped out of it, quickly. “Luna, it's--” “Swear it.” “I-- swear what?” Luna looked up, eyes desperately pleading. “Swear that there's nothing more.” A prickle of dread crawled up the back of Celestia's neck. This was thorny territory indeed. “Can you be more specific? I don't want to mislead you with a misunderstanding.” “Swear to me that it was only your duty to Equestria that stopped you from having a child when you were younger, after I was gone.” Relief flooded into Celestia's heart. There was still an honest way out of this. “There are other reasons. Back then I would have needed to take a husband to have a foal. The scandal of an illegitimate birth would have been more than I had to clout to withstand in those early years. I'd have been forced to open the throne, and myself, to all the politics and influences that a union would bring.” She turned another step into a steady creep closer to her sister, who looked down again to avoid eye contact by the second sneaky inch taken. “I'd have created a dynasty, Luna. A line of heirs no different from the old unicorn kingdom, with no more promise that any would be worthy rulers than they'd ever had. And it would have been an affront to both the earth ponies and the pegasi to chain them to such a royal lineage after the founders worked so hard to strike a balance between the ways of the old nations. They were dubious enough of us taking our thrones, even with a constitution to protect them! “And who could I have wed? To take a lover from any tribe would've been seen as an insult to the other two at a time when peace between them was still a novelty. And to marry just for a child, to a politically convenient stallion who I might have felt nothing for? Who might himself care nothing for our child but as political leverage? And then the terrible risks of bearing a child in those days. To lose them, or to be so weakened in labor that I couldn't lead or defend myself against opportunists… “No, Luna.” Celestia closed the gap by another step. If she could just get a wing around her… “I couldn't have had a child then. By the time I created an Equestria I'd have felt safe having a child in, it would have already been too late. And I no longer had the time, regardless.” Luna kept her eyes low. “And is that all? Do you swear there was nothing more?” Celestia's approach stalled while she swallowed the bitter taste clawing its way up her throat. Luna wasn't going to let this go until she got what she wanted. Worse than that, she might not let this go until she got what she'd already convinced herself was true. She was left with a question she'd asked herself more times than she could ever hope to count over the last thousand years. How do I lie without lying? “I could stand here all day and lay out more and more specific reasons--” “Stop it!” Luna stomped hard enough to crack the floorboards. “You know what I'm asking, so just answer me! Swear to me that I'm not-- S-swear that it wasn't--” “Luna, please--” Celestia tried to close the remaining gap, wings reaching out, but Luna pulled even further away until she stood just beyond the pantry's threshold. Brimming tears threatened to spill down her cheeks at the slightest urging. “Swear to me that you weren't waiting for me.” “Please, listen to me, Luna--” “Swear it!” “It's not your fault!” “THEN SAY THE WORDS!” The force of Luna's Voice struck like a tidal wave in the confined space. Celestia staggered into an involuntary rear as the gust caught against her wings and chest, only stopping when she smacked the back of her head against the frosted dome of the ceiling lamp. Her forehooves found the floor again alongside a flurry of shattered glass. Neither noise covered the snap of Luna's teleport, or the sharp gasp she'd made just before it. She was probably up in her room, in tears, before Celestia had even fully processed what had happened. She hadn't gotten much further before she heard her guards kicking in the front door. She heaved a leaden sigh that ought to have plunged clean through to the basement floor under its own weight. So much for breaking the news gently. “Please let me in, Luna. I'm not-- ah! Angry. It wasn't as bad-- ow! As it looked. Please, sister-- nh!” Celestia twisted to glare at the unicorn guard next to her and his hateful little tweezers. “Would you please stop that?” The guard medic dropped a ruby-stained sliver of glass into the completely unnecessary medical waste bag floating beside him in his navy blue aura. “Sorry, ma'am, orders are orders. Please hold still.” “Ugh, honestly, I'll be fine. This is barely a scratch.” She raised her voice slightly on the latter part for her sister's benefit. “Her Majesty's orders in the event of an injury were explicit. Now, hold still.” Celestia narrowed her eyes. “I didn't surrender all of my authority, you know. I may not hold court, but I'm still a princess of Equestria.” “You're free to file a reprimand for my next review. In the meantime, I'm your medic, and you have glass in your head. Now,” Celestia reluctantly let his magic bring her head back down to where he could see what he was doing, “hold. Still.” “As I was-- nk! …Saying. I just want to talk to you, Luna. It's-- ow! Ow! Either stop it or hurry up! I don't have time for this.” The medic snorted. “When did you ever have time?” “When did you get so surly, Quick Splint?” “When you appointed me to your personal guard, that's when.” Splint's tweezers dove back into her mane. “That's when I realized what a full time job it was keeping you in one piece.” “Oh, don't be ridiculous.” “Ridiculous is thinking that just because you don't age that you don't have to worry about long term consequences. You should be in the hospital right now instead of camping out in front of your sister's room over whatever fight you've had this time.” Celestia didn't answer. She stayed quiet while Splint picked a further three slivers of glass out of her scalp. It wasn't until he set the tweezers aside and fished out the antiseptic that she spoke again. “You don't have siblings, do you?” “No, ma'am.” “I thought not. You want-- ah! To speak of long term consequences, Splint? I spent a thousand years living with the consequences of ignoring my little sister. I believe that's roughly sixteen times longer than you have been alive. Can you imagine being separated from somepony you love for so long because she believed that nopony loved her? Because you cared more about taking care of your own petty problems than your sister's happiness? “Compared to that, I am not in the least bit concerned over some scratches leaving a few measly scars that nopony would ever be able to see. I have come too close to repeating my mistakes to risk it again. Now--” The door latch clicked. A dark blue hoof pushed the wooden barrier just enough for one tearful, cyan eye to peek through. The swab beat a hasty retreat into the waste bag. “No siblings, three daughters. I think that'll do for now, ma'am.” Splint swept his gear back into his medkit and snapped to a salute. “I'll leave you to it.” Celestia rose from the carpet without a word while the guard withdrew. A ginger touch of her hoof eased the door the rest of the way open. Luna shuffled in place on the other side of the threshold, eyes down. “Celestia—” “I was waiting for you.” Luna's neck sagged. “I know. I'm sorry.” “I know. So am I.” “Is there no spell?” Luna lifted her eyes just enough. “After all these years?” “The doctor said there might be… options. She's never seen a case quite like mine. I-- I couldn't. Not today. I needed to come home. I--” her voice caught. She cleared her throat as she'd done too many times, at the countless eulogies and speeches she'd given when all she'd ever wanted was to crawl into bed and sob. There were guards outside. The neighbors would hear. Twilight was still so new to the throne. Everypony needed to know that she was still there, ready to catch her if she fell. She couldn't shake that image, not yet. Maybe not ever. A tickle of familiar magic washed over her. Luna's horn painted the walls with it's azure glow. A tight field that melded into every surface, pulsed twice, then faded from sight. A soundproofing spell. Neighbors and guards alike went about their business, none the wiser. To them, Celestia would stay just as she'd always been: Beautiful and timeless. Nopony saw her legs fold beneath her like a house of cards. Nopony watched Luna rush to embrace her just in time to break her fall. Nopony heard her wails for what could never be.
Chapter 1Celestia had unfortunate effects on the nerves of most ponies, even five years into retirement, but medical professionals got it worst. Something about confronting the idea of her having imperfect health made things so much more difficult for them than for spa workers or waiters. Doctor Flowering Branch was doing pretty well so far in Celestia's estimation. Better than the nurses and receptionist had done, certainly. Dr. Branch's ocean blue mane wasn't frizzed from panic, and she hadn't sweat through either her seafoam fur coat or her white cloth one. Which wasn't to say she that wasn't cowering on the other side of her desk like a foal facing a reprimand from her principal. “Please, have a seat, er, your Majesty?” Celestia offered a gracious smile to the doctor that would hopefully offset any awkwardness that her decision to sit down on the floor between the two guest chairs might cause. Cozy as this particular doctor's office was, the chairs were severely undersized for her frame. The doctor cringed but, encouragingly, didn't whimper in despair or babble about back-orders like the poor mare in the lobby had. It was hardly their faults, but saying anything, no matter how kindly, would only throw it into sharper relief. Yes, most places in Canterlot went out of their way to make sure they had something on hoof for her. And, yes, sitting on the floor was hardly the most comfortable way to conduct a meeting. But after a thousand years of apparent chastity and abstinence, any fair minded pony ought to be able to forgive a fertility specialist for not expecting her, of all ponies, to make an appointment. Better to change the topic entirely. Try to make the mare more comfortable by setting a ground rule for her to hold onto. The title, perhaps. Getting anypony to simply call her “Celestia” was still like pulling cragadile teeth, but they should all know that Twilight and Cadance were the “Majesties” by now. Every little bit of reinforcement in that direction helped. “Please, you don't have to call me that anymore, Doctor Branch. I'm just Celestia now. Or 'Princess', if you'd prefer.” “Oh, er, yes.” A fraction of Dr. Branch's tension bled away to make room for an equal measure of a doctor's confidence. “Of course, er, Princess. Is there anything you'd like before we get started?” Celestia's smile broadened ever so slightly. Gotcha. “No, thank you. I'm quite eager to hear your thoughts on my issue.” To her credit, the doctor didn't blush at the prospect, instead drawing on a little more of her reserves of professionalism. “Of course, Princess. I've… ahem, I've had a look at your file, and your description of the problem. And, well…” Celestia's smile growth neatly reversed itself. Dr. Branch looked uncomfortable as she shuffled her papers into some sort of order with her magic. Uncomfortable in a far more professional sense than before. Then again, she'd never actually gotten “bad news” from a doctor before. Not for herself. Perhaps she was making a maulwurf out of a mole. Dr. Branch eventually set the papers down in a neat stack and looked up. “I have a few questions I'd like to ask you to help me narrow things down.” “Of course.” “With regard to your age. Er, I know that our standard form only gave you three digits to work with. Could you give me a more precise value?” “How precise do you need?” “Er,” Dr. Branch rubbed a hoof against her opposing leg. “Within a decade? If you can?” Celestia nodded. “I believe I am somewhere in my 1,170's. Probably between 1,172 and 1,174.” “You're not certain?” “It was somewhat difficult to keep track of time during Discord's reign. It's one of the reasons I eventually reset the calendar entirely.” The doctor's eyes and mouth both went round for a moment before she caught herself. “Yes. Yes, well, that's certainly close enough to help.” “I'm aware that age plays a role in fertility, but I've not changed significantly since my late twenties. Every other medical examination I've had has remarked on that.” “Er, yes. Yes! Yes, that was all in-- in your file, yes.” Too much. She'd probably come across as questioning her expertise rather than… what had she meant by that? Looking back, that'd almost sounded defensive. Dr. Branch was cringing again and those files had to be completely out of order by now. Celestia straightened up. This would not do. She was here to be told not to tell. “Doctor, I must confess something to you: I'm not very well versed in medicine.” The doctor rocked back in her seat, shocked by her bluntness, no doubt. “I'm somewhat behind the times in a great deal of scientific knowledge, in fact. I've always made sure to surround myself with knowledgeable ponies to help me manage policy, as there was never enough time for me to learn it all for myself, but that has never been more necessary than in the last century. I've come here for much the same reason. If I make any wrong-headed assumptions, please, do not hesitate to correct me, and certainly don't take my word as the final one.” She swallowed. Would it be too much to say more? The doctor still looked nervous, but a more personal plea might make her uncomfortable. Then again… Branch was a doctor in a very personal field. It might be what she was used to. She ducked her head slightly. “This is important to me, doctor. I don't want to miss out on this because I'm doing something wrong. If you think my age is important then, please, ask your next question.” Dr. Branch glanced down at her files, then back up to Celestia. “I'm not sure, Princess, but most of the patients I see who are having this much difficulty conceiving have something conspicuous in their medical history. An injury, a past bout of a disease that can impact fertility, symptoms of a hormone imbalance, something like that. Your age is the thing that leaps out at me as the one thing you don't have in common with most mares. Er,” a slight pink tinge crept into her cheeks, “besides your size, I mean. And, er…” Celestia's smile came back, just a little. “Being an alicorn?” “Er, yes. But with Princess Cadenza's success in mind, I really think we should start with your age. I have a few questions that weren't covered by the, er, volumes of your older medical history that I could get my hooves on, if that's alright?” “Ask anything you like.” “Have you… ever tried before?” “No.” Branch's eyebrows shot up. “Never?” “Never intentionally. I… did have a close call once. An accident, if you will. But nothing came of it.” “How long ago was this?” “Five hundred forty nine years ago. I remember the date quite clearly,” she added in answer to the doctor's obvious incredulity. “For better or worse, it was a memorable event.” The doctor visibly went back and forth with herself, then shook her head and set her jaw with determination. “Forgive me, Princess, but I'm afraid I'm going to have to be very direct with you about this if we're going to get anywhere.” Here we go. Much better. “Please.” “How long have you suspected that you've had a fertility problem?” “Just in the last two years.” “You had no reason to suspect anything during the last millennium?” “No, I did not.” “…How?” “A solemn vow. One that I finally fulfilled five years ago. And one that I only failed to uphold on a single night, five hundred forty nine years ago.” Branch's ears drooped. “Oh. And… after that night?” “I made use of what options were available at the time to prevent a pregnancy and counted my blessings when my next cycle hit.” Like a train, as she recalled. Not that they'd been invented yet. It was as if her body decided she needed to be punished for her indiscretion in the pettiest way possible. “I-- I cannot even imagine the self control you must have.” Celestia chuckled. “Oh, you get used to it. I hardly ever thought about it anymore after the first few hundred years.” Branch snorted. “I didn't make it to twenty!” Celestia perked up. “You have children?” And there was the blush. Hesitantly, Branch turned a picture frame on her desk around in her magic. A little photograph of herself snuggled against a rather charming looking pegasus stallion, surrounded by five adorable colts and fillies ranging from foal to preteen. “Oh, my. I see I came to the right doctor.” The photo whipped back around, much to Celestia's amusement, while the doctor tried her best to get her decorum back. Gotcha again! “Anyway. About your cycle. Have you noticed anything unusual about it? Late or early starts, missed cycles, extreme variations in intensity?” “All three. I've always been irregular. My past doctors put it down to stress, but I haven't looked into it any further than that until now.” “Always?” Branch looked her straight in the eye, all business once more. She really was handling herself quite well. Luna's recommendation was looking better by the minute. “Are you sure?” The word 'yes' was on the tip of Celestia's tongue when it paused at the jump. She had been, hadn't she? Stress was a very well known cause for such problems, even back when she was up to date on medicine, and she'd always had a stressful life. But then again… For all the irritation that a mare's cycle could bring, it was a routine irritation. Memory filtered routine like ears filtered the background noise of a busy city, and it was so very long ago. But surely she could recall her first time going through it? Luna would still have been a filly at the time, of course, but when she was older… “No. I don't think I am. I… No,” she said, more firmly than before. “I was regular at first. My sister and I would always hit ours at nearly the same time, living together like we did. Then, after she was gone, I-- I stayed mostly regular. I was under a lot of stress at the time, but I leveled out after a few years.” “When did that change?” Celestia's wings ruffled. When? It must have been centuries ago for her to have so fully forgotten. “I want to say… in my sixties? No, seventies? I'm sorry, but I just don't remember.” “That's alright, Princess. That's close enough.” “Is it important?” “Maybe.” Papers rearranged again; Celestia was starting to suspect a nervous tick on Branch's part, but this time seemed a touch more purposeful. “I know I saw it in here… aha! Here we are!” A single page leaped triumphantly above the rest. “Let me see… it says here that you use a few prescription grooming products for ponies with excessive shedding?” At last it was Celestia's turn to flush. “Ah, yes. I have quite a bit more fur to manage than the average mare, and my mane and tail can be rather troublesome at times.” Branch's smile was warm and reassuring. “I understand, Princess. I never would have guessed if it wasn't in your files. You also molt your feathers, yes? And have to keep your hooves trimmed?” Celestia nodded to both. Branch slumped as if a great weight had just landed on her back. “I was afraid of that.” These were rather odd questions. The excessive shedding she could understand perhaps being a sign of an underlying hormonal problem for anypony else. But molting? Not excessive or irregular molting, but simply molting, period? And hoof trimming? What was the connection? “I don't wish to question your expertise, again I'm not well versed in this area, but how are my hooves and feathers related to my fertility?” “What you've told me is that your body is still… aging, in a way,” Branch told her desk. “Your feathers and the hairs of your coat are still growing, wearing out, and getting replaced, which suggests that your biological processes are running at the same rate as any other pony. If that's true, then… I think I know where to start.” A cold knot balled up deep in Celestia's stomach. She couldn't mean-- no, no the math didn't work out. She was no doctor but she wasn't ignorant. “I know a mare is born with all of her eggs already formed, but we have many hundreds of thousands of them, don't we? I couldn't have-- surely I still-- I mean, I'm not that old!” Branch's hoof pushed a sheet of paper a little to the left, her eyes staying resolutely down and away from Celestia's while she answered. “The actual number can vary anywhere from the tens of thousands to the millions, but the average mare is in the range of five or six hundred thousand at birth. One is released per cycle so you'd expect a mare to still have hundreds of thousands by the time she hits middle age. But… that's not how it works out. “You see, for every egg released, many more just… die. The average mare might only have a thousand eggs left by the time she reaches the end of her foaling years. Maybe less. Every medical metric we have says that you're a mare in her late twenties or early thirties, but I don't know why or how you've stayed that way. If your cells are still aging and dying at anything close to a normal rate like it seems, and your apparent overall age is because your body is just really good at replacing them, then I'm afraid that--” “How do we find out?” Celestia rasped. Branch's head ducked lower, ears pinned back hard. “There's a test. We--” “When?” “I ordered the lab to start setting up as soon as you arrived. They should be ready for us by now.” Celestia's knotted stomach followed the rest of her to her hooves under strenuous protest. “Lead the way.”
Chapter 2The sound of wingbeats drew Luna to the front window like a filly to a plate of cookies. That it turned out to be the mail delivery made her wilt like a filly who discovered those same cookies were unsweetened licorice snaps. She ducked away from the blinds and looked to the treacherous clock. She could swear that Discord was sneaking in backward ticks when she wasn't looking. It was well and truly impossible for it to have only been five minutes since the last time she'd checked. “What is taking you so long?” She had been assured that Celestia's first visit to the clinic would be only an hour or two at most. Dr. Branch had come highly recommended to her by one of her own guards. A miracle worker, that was what she'd been promised. And that was what she, in turn, had promised Celestia. “It only took my wife two hours,” Nightwatch had told her. “A few questions and some bloodwork was all the doctor needed to figure everything out.” They'd had foal number two on the way even as Celestia's negative tests piled up. She picked up her pacing once more. The doctors would help her sister. Modern medicine was nothing but miracles! Why anypony would resist visiting such skilled healers she could only imagine came down to lack of perspective. A perspective that her sister ought to have had, and yet it'd taken twisting all four of her legs to get her to go. Surely she could see that these modern healers were nothing like the ones of their youth? Those blustering fools took Meadowbrook's disappearance as an excuse to turn back nearly two decades of progress out of blind spite for her brilliance. That her cure for Swamp Fever had ever been lost was a travesty. Luna knew things were different, for not once since her return, not once, had she been prescribed a leeching. Long had she suspected that the principal benefit of leeches was to steer the patient's complaints away from their illness and towards the leeches, thus giving them an ailment the self-important quacks could legitimately claim to know how to solve. For every healer applying useful cures back in her youth, there were a dozen with family in the leech farming business. The world was well rid of such nonsense now, and better for it! Unless Celestia knew something she didn't? What if Celestia had a good reason to resist visiting a fertility clinic? What if she'd lead Celestia astray? What if they couldn't help her? What if she'd gotten her hopes up for nothing after she'd already waited for so long? What if that was--? Luna stopped in her tracks and shook her head hard. “Enough of this! It will be fine! Celestia will be fine! It's not your faul--” she took a deep breath, “it's not my fault. She was merely… busy. She was just too busy to have foals all that time. She said so herself.” She glanced up at the clock. Three minutes this time. Liar. “Celestia wouldn't lie though. Not about that. It will all be fine.” She assumed her most royal posture before her audience of overstuffed lounge furniture. “All shall be well! Celestia will return with good news, and we shall celebrate the coming of a new niece or nephew. Then there shall be two royal foals, and the doting shall be doubled!” Her royal facade crumbled slightly. “Except that Celestia will be too busy with her own child to join me in my visits to Flurry. Celestia always sets our agenda when we foalsit for Cadance and Shining Armor. What would I even do with Flurry without her--” her expression turned to horror, “I'll have to foalsit for Celestia. She'll leave her own child in my hooves whenever she gallivants off on one of her thrill-seeking romps with Twilight Velvet. She certainly can't take a foal rappelling down the Abysmal Abyss with them, or whatever other mad idea they think of next.” Luna's pacing began anew, back and forth between the sofa and the open doorway to the kitchen. “Will I have to move out? She and the foal will need space; I can't always be hovering around while Celestia is mothering her foal! I'll be an intruder, a-- a third wheel! I'll need to find my own place. Is the other side of town far enough or should I move to another city? I've never lived alone before! I-- I--” A deep shiver stopped her in her tracks. Her next words shook in her suddenly arid throat. “I've never lived alone before.” Outside the sisters' house, two lightly armored royal guards stood at uneasy attention at either side of the front door, made uneasy by the muffled ranting just audible through the bay window on the front wall. The more junior guard, a pegasus stallion, flinched at the sound of some piece of furniture being violently disturbed. “Should we, uh, do something?” His more senior unicorn comrade shook his head. Another heavy thump rattled the window along with a muted expletive. “Are you sure?” “This is normal.” A duller third thump came just before a louder second expletive. “She gets like this whenever Princess Celestia goes anywhere new without her since they retired. She'll calm down soon.” The confidence of his voice was only somewhat belied by a wary twitch of his ear. “Probably.” A new, more rhythmic series of thuds suspiciously akin to what a larger than average head might make when thumped upon a coffee table didn't do the younger guard's nerves any favors. “Will she be okay?” “Just keep watching for paparazzi, Private. Anything else about these two is out of our league.” Luna let herself slump over the coffee table from her decidedly un-regal seat on the carpet. She was being ridiculous, of course she was being ridiculous. Celestia wasn't going to notice that she'd kicked an end table out of place. Even if she had, she wouldn't have made an issue out of it. She wouldn't have gotten worried or questioned if she was okay or needed help or any of the other thousand things she was afraid of, so panicking as she had was completely absurd. She might notice the new horn-gouges in the coffee table, but who was counting by this point? Wandering eyes landing on the clock told her that it has been six minutes this time. Six miserable little minutes. Minutes which she'd been promised were so close in length to those told by the minute glasses of yesteryear as to be indistinguishable. She wished to believe otherwise. She'd rather believe that time was a flexible, mutable thing that sought to twist itself into knots for the pleasure of torturing ponies who had something to wait for. That would give her anything to blame but herself for her misery. “Where are you? What is taking so long?” As much as she resented the doctors of the past, it wasn't the leeches behind the specter of dread clawing at the back of her neck. That stemmed from the other sort of doctor's prescription. The kind that even the kindest and most reputable of doctors from her youth would give far too often: try to make her comfortable. Being given leeches meant that the doctor thought that treatment was an option. So many ponies never had that option. Even modern doctors would sometimes face the grim reality that comfort was all they would be able to offer. But it couldn't be bad news. Celestia's health was impeccable. She hadn't aged a day in the past thousand years. Years spent in the care of ponies who would sooner feast on salads of poison joke and thistles than let her fall into ill health. Then again… she wasn't quite as she'd used to be, was she? Her strength and stamina were certainly not what they once were, but that was plainly a lack of exercise. That she'd maintained any measure of fitness after a millennium of sedentary political life was proof itself of her strong constitution! “She'll be fine. She'll return any minute now with nothing but good news. Perhaps she's… stopped to grab a treat, to celebrate! A cake, or-- or a--” The front door unlatched. “Luna! I'm home!” Luna scrambled off the floor to meet her sister in the front hall just as the door shut again. “Celestia! Where have… you…?” That… was a great deal of food. A great deal. Bulging bags of every sweet, starchy, or otherwise decadent thing the pair of them ever ate, all crammed into the negative space around her sister. Even more of ingredients for favorite dishes, and multiple boxes bearing the branding of local bakeries, candy makers, and at least two pizzerias. That her sister was within the swarm was an educated guess best supported by the sunny yellow magic holding it all having to come from somewhere. “Oh, don't mind me, just a few groceries.” The wall of edibles advanced like a pantry avalanche. A pizza box departed the flock to hover under Luna's nose, or close enough for a mare whose view was mostly blocked by baguettes. “Here! Three-mushroom and three cheese with olives. Please, help yourself while I put this all away.” Luna took hold of the box with her magic more out of reflex than any understanding of what was happening. Her attention stayed on the floating grocery store as it blindly negotiated its way around the doorway into the kitchen. Outlying bags bumped against the frame to be dragged through behind the rest of the swarm in its passing. Only once her sister's entourage was out of sight did Luna jar herself back into action to follow in stunned silence. The gnawing ache in the pit of her stomach had very little to do with her appetite. “What do you think, Luna? Scalloped potatoes tonight?” Five pounds worth of potatoes rose into an indecisive hover over the main island counter where Luna sat with her half-eaten pizza. Appetite, it transpired, returned quickly enough when duly provoked after a skipped lunch. “Do you prefer skins on or off?” “Either way is fine. How was the doctor's visit?” Celestia started to weave the potatoes through the floating obstacle course of food she'd yet to put away that still hovered around her. Plenty of it already occupied the available counter space along the wall and the island, and more had been stowed away in the walk-in pantry and both refrigerators. Luna didn't know if she should be glad they'd gotten a kitchen big enough to keep up with her sister, or resent its size for enabling her. “Skin on it is. Potatoes are nothing but starch otherwise.” “Most of this proposed dinner is nothing but starch.” Luna hefted another sloppy slice of thoroughly cheesed pizza in her magic. “The rest is oil or sugar.” “Oh, don't exaggerate,” Celestia scoffed. “Hmm… strawberry cheesecake for dessert tonight or the Germane chocolate cake?” “Either. Now, about the doctor--” Both cakes whizzed past on the way to the refrigerator. “I suppose we can pick when we get there! Let me see, where should I put these bananas? I was thinking of making banana bread this weekend, they ought to be just ripe enough by then. Oh, where is the ice cream? That needs to go away before it melts.” Luna took a grumpy bite of pizza to stifle her own grumbling. It was bad enough that her sister had made her sit in worry for hours upon hours just so that she could buy enough food to sate a gang of adolescent dragons for her to hide behind, but to blithely ignore her and talk over her? It was only marginally less insulting than outright lying. Celestia was good at hiding her thoughts, but not her feelings. Never her feelings. Not even a thousand years of practice could stop it all being right there in her eyes. That, presumably, was why Celestia refused to look at her. “I picked up some of that sourdough you like as well.” “Celestia.” Potatoes thudded into the sink. “Ugh, really, Luna. It was a doctor's visit. Lots of questions, cold implements, and undersized furniture. Now, do you see the ice cream anywhere or not?” “You put it away five minutes ago.” Celestia paused mid step. She cast her eyes about the groceries still scattered about the air and countertops and everywhere that wasn't Luna, before hesitantly asking, “are you sure?” “It went in the left refrigerator after the eggs, milk, and brie, but before the puff pastry, mozzarella, and root beer.” Celestia shook off her moment of uncertainty and beamed a smile in no particular direction. “Ah! Of course. Have you ever tried a root beer float? I thought we could have some on the deck tomorrow while we grill up the carrots. The weather scheduled is perfect for a little cookout. I can make that potato salad we had last month that you liked.” Luna threw down her crust. “That is enough, sister. Out with it!” The groceries closed ranks around Celestia, particularly around her face. “I… don't know what you mean.” “You're hiding something, and I want to know what it is. Need I remind you what happens when we are not honest with one another?” “I'm not hiding--” “That's IT!” Luna kicked away her stool and stormed around the island towards her backpedaling sister, who made the unfortunate tactical blunder of letting herself get backed into the pantry. “I will tolerate your evasions.” Her aura lanced through her sister's to tug the groceries from her grasp. “And I will tolerate your diversions.” She set it all aside, jamming it in wherever it'd fit and leaving nothing for Celestia to cower behind but her own mane. “I will even tolerate being told that something is not my business.” Celestia's tail bumped into the shelves of dry goods at the back of the pantry. “But you will NOT lie to me!” Luna glared up at her sister who still kept her face turned safely away behind the curtain of her mane. Rare though it was for anypony to challenge Celestia so directly, Luna had enjoyed the privilege enough times to imagine the expressions warring across her visage as the seconds ticked by. Luna didn't need for Celestia to turn her head to know the look of abject defeat that must have settled into her eyes when she finally sat down upon the hardwood floor. “What if,” Celestia cleared her throat of the terrible rasp those words came with, “what if I said it wasn't your business now?” “The contents of your movable feast tell a much different story.” Celestia's head came up just enough for one eye to glance around at the now haphazardly stocked shelves around them. “I eat when I'm upset, I admit that. But--” “You eat when you're frustrated. You cook when you're upset. You cook for others when you're upset for them.” A loaf of hearty, crusty bread floated between them. “You hate sourdough, sister. You bought it because you know that I love it.” The loaf found its place in the general vicinity of the other breads. “You've brought home just about every food that I've told you I liked since my return, on top of what few remain from the old days. Your plan, so far as I can see, is to stuff me with food until I am no longer able to walk under my own power. What am I to imagine this means, sister?” Celestia's neck drooped until her mane spilled over her face entirely once more. “I… can't.” Luna snorted and scuffed the floor hard enough to scratch the tiles. “You cannot say. You have spent two years fixated on this matter, talking my ears off about it at every opportunity. All those late evenings spent designing and redesigning your dream nursery. A list of foals names longer than a full-grown sea serpent, and now you have nothing left to say on the matter? Can you imagine for one moment how frightened I am right now, sister?” Celestia cringed. “Have you any idea how it feels to see you return from a doctor in such a state? Have you forgotten what such a thing used to mean?” “I can't,” Celestia whispered, almost pleading. “Luna, I can't.” “Why! Why can't you tell me? Why…” Too late Luna saw how Celestia was shivering. How her wings were clamped tight to sides that shuddered with suppressed sobs. And how the tiny puddles of water at her forehooves accumulated drop by drop. “I am telling you, Luna.” Luna tore her eyes off the teardrops. “I don't understand.” “The doctor told me that I'm… I'm in 'perfect' health. I have the body of a twenty-five year old mare, and that's the only thing wrong with me.” Luna's brow furrowed deeply. That wasn't a joke. It ought to have been a joke; Celestia had made such jokes after routine (and thoroughly unnecessary) doctor's visits before. 'Setting a good example', she called them, and Luna had seen the wisdom of it after her first encounter with a newspaper. But those good-natured japes were delivered with the effortless humor of a mare untouchable. There was no humor in her now. “What do you mean? Please, speak plainly, sister.” Celestia sniffed and dabbed at her eyes beneath the veil of her mane. “I'm old, Luna. I'm so old, but my body thinks I'm still so young. Every cycle goes wrong, but my magic says that everything is fine and to keep trying. So it just keeps trying over and over again. For a thousand years my body has been telling me that there was still a chance. That it wasn't already too late.” Luna was not as ignorant of the modern era as once she'd been, owing to many hours of devoted study in the royal libraries. One particularly awkward tome represented society's best attempt to explain the miracle of foaling to the common pony without using any of the dozens of words that would have done the job in moments. The common pony knew just enough for the bottom drop to out of her stomach a mere moment before Celestia gave her condition a name. Had the blow been delivered by one of the Crystal Empire's champion jousters it could not have struck so true. “I'm sterile, Luna. I've been sterile for over nine-hundred years.”
Chapter 3Conventional wisdom held that the anticipation of a dreaded event was often worse than the event itself. Long experience had taught Celestia that, while this was true more often than not, the exceptions to that rule were often the cruelest of all. No amount of dreadful anticipation could be worse than the actual moment when a mare watched her little sister's heart break. Luna liked to poke fun at her for her constant redesigns, or fawning over names, or any of the other silly things she'd gotten up to since deciding to try for a foal. Yet several sketches of cribs and mobiles bore her signature. Dozens upon dozens of names on the overlong list were written in her elegant, looping script. And countless nursery designs featured her glittering constellations on the ceiling. The sadness for a dream lost was awful to see. The moment when sadness turned to guilt and shame was so much worse. “Luna, it's--” “It's not my fault.” Luna took a step back. “It's not.” A tentative flicker of hope caught light in Celestia's chest. “No, of course it's not.” “You were busy.” “That's right.” “Leading Equestria alone was hard work.” “Yes, it was.” “And if I'd been there--” “It wouldn't have changed that,” Celestia declared. “A child takes so much time and devotion. Single parents with ordinary jobs already struggle to strike the right balance. Even together, leading Equestria was no ordinary job.” “Cadance-” “Has a husband, and in-laws, and friends all ready to help, and fewer citizens to look after than the mayor of Manehatten.” Celestia rose to her hooves and took a tentative step closer. “Could you imagine me asking Twilight to foalsit for me ten years ago? I might have lost her to a heart attack on the spot!” That didn't get the smile she'd hoped for. Luna's eyes were downcast, yet darted back and forth as if searching for some revelation from the floorboards. Her ears flitted between drooping and pinning back as each new thought set her mood spiraling in some horrible new direction. She needed to be snapped out of it, quickly. “Luna, it's--” “Swear it.” “I-- swear what?” Luna looked up, eyes desperately pleading. “Swear that there's nothing more.” A prickle of dread crawled up the back of Celestia's neck. This was thorny territory indeed. “Can you be more specific? I don't want to mislead you with a misunderstanding.” “Swear to me that it was only your duty to Equestria that stopped you from having a child when you were younger, after I was gone.” Relief flooded into Celestia's heart. There was still an honest way out of this. “There are other reasons. Back then I would have needed to take a husband to have a foal. The scandal of an illegitimate birth would have been more than I had to clout to withstand in those early years. I'd have been forced to open the throne, and myself, to all the politics and influences that a union would bring.” She turned another step into a steady creep closer to her sister, who looked down again to avoid eye contact by the second sneaky inch taken. “I'd have created a dynasty, Luna. A line of heirs no different from the old unicorn kingdom, with no more promise that any would be worthy rulers than they'd ever had. And it would have been an affront to both the earth ponies and the pegasi to chain them to such a royal lineage after the founders worked so hard to strike a balance between the ways of the old nations. They were dubious enough of us taking our thrones, even with a constitution to protect them! “And who could I have wed? To take a lover from any tribe would've been seen as an insult to the other two at a time when peace between them was still a novelty. And to marry just for a child, to a politically convenient stallion who I might have felt nothing for? Who might himself care nothing for our child but as political leverage? And then the terrible risks of bearing a child in those days. To lose them, or to be so weakened in labor that I couldn't lead or defend myself against opportunists… “No, Luna.” Celestia closed the gap by another step. If she could just get a wing around her… “I couldn't have had a child then. By the time I created an Equestria I'd have felt safe having a child in, it would have already been too late. And I no longer had the time, regardless.” Luna kept her eyes low. “And is that all? Do you swear there was nothing more?” Celestia's approach stalled while she swallowed the bitter taste clawing its way up her throat. Luna wasn't going to let this go until she got what she wanted. Worse than that, she might not let this go until she got what she'd already convinced herself was true. She was left with a question she'd asked herself more times than she could ever hope to count over the last thousand years. How do I lie without lying? “I could stand here all day and lay out more and more specific reasons--” “Stop it!” Luna stomped hard enough to crack the floorboards. “You know what I'm asking, so just answer me! Swear to me that I'm not-- S-swear that it wasn't--” “Luna, please--” Celestia tried to close the remaining gap, wings reaching out, but Luna pulled even further away until she stood just beyond the pantry's threshold. Brimming tears threatened to spill down her cheeks at the slightest urging. “Swear to me that you weren't waiting for me.” “Please, listen to me, Luna--” “Swear it!” “It's not your fault!” “THEN SAY THE WORDS!” The force of Luna's Voice struck like a tidal wave in the confined space. Celestia staggered into an involuntary rear as the gust caught against her wings and chest, only stopping when she smacked the back of her head against the frosted dome of the ceiling lamp. Her forehooves found the floor again alongside a flurry of shattered glass. Neither noise covered the snap of Luna's teleport, or the sharp gasp she'd made just before it. She was probably up in her room, in tears, before Celestia had even fully processed what had happened. She hadn't gotten much further before she heard her guards kicking in the front door. She heaved a leaden sigh that ought to have plunged clean through to the basement floor under its own weight. So much for breaking the news gently. “Please let me in, Luna. I'm not-- ah! Angry. It wasn't as bad-- ow! As it looked. Please, sister-- nh!” Celestia twisted to glare at the unicorn guard next to her and his hateful little tweezers. “Would you please stop that?” The guard medic dropped a ruby-stained sliver of glass into the completely unnecessary medical waste bag floating beside him in his navy blue aura. “Sorry, ma'am, orders are orders. Please hold still.” “Ugh, honestly, I'll be fine. This is barely a scratch.” She raised her voice slightly on the latter part for her sister's benefit. “Her Majesty's orders in the event of an injury were explicit. Now, hold still.” Celestia narrowed her eyes. “I didn't surrender all of my authority, you know. I may not hold court, but I'm still a princess of Equestria.” “You're free to file a reprimand for my next review. In the meantime, I'm your medic, and you have glass in your head. Now,” Celestia reluctantly let his magic bring her head back down to where he could see what he was doing, “hold. Still.” “As I was-- nk! …Saying. I just want to talk to you, Luna. It's-- ow! Ow! Either stop it or hurry up! I don't have time for this.” The medic snorted. “When did you ever have time?” “When did you get so surly, Quick Splint?” “When you appointed me to your personal guard, that's when.” Splint's tweezers dove back into her mane. “That's when I realized what a full time job it was keeping you in one piece.” “Oh, don't be ridiculous.” “Ridiculous is thinking that just because you don't age that you don't have to worry about long term consequences. You should be in the hospital right now instead of camping out in front of your sister's room over whatever fight you've had this time.” Celestia didn't answer. She stayed quiet while Splint picked a further three slivers of glass out of her scalp. It wasn't until he set the tweezers aside and fished out the antiseptic that she spoke again. “You don't have siblings, do you?” “No, ma'am.” “I thought not. You want-- ah! To speak of long term consequences, Splint? I spent a thousand years living with the consequences of ignoring my little sister. I believe that's roughly sixteen times longer than you have been alive. Can you imagine being separated from somepony you love for so long because she believed that nopony loved her? Because you cared more about taking care of your own petty problems than your sister's happiness? “Compared to that, I am not in the least bit concerned over some scratches leaving a few measly scars that nopony would ever be able to see. I have come too close to repeating my mistakes to risk it again. Now--” The door latch clicked. A dark blue hoof pushed the wooden barrier just enough for one tearful, cyan eye to peek through. The swab beat a hasty retreat into the waste bag. “No siblings, three daughters. I think that'll do for now, ma'am.” Splint swept his gear back into his medkit and snapped to a salute. “I'll leave you to it.” Celestia rose from the carpet without a word while the guard withdrew. A ginger touch of her hoof eased the door the rest of the way open. Luna shuffled in place on the other side of the threshold, eyes down. “Celestia—” “I was waiting for you.” Luna's neck sagged. “I know. I'm sorry.” “I know. So am I.” “Is there no spell?” Luna lifted her eyes just enough. “After all these years?” “The doctor said there might be… options. She's never seen a case quite like mine. I-- I couldn't. Not today. I needed to come home. I--” her voice caught. She cleared her throat as she'd done too many times, at the countless eulogies and speeches she'd given when all she'd ever wanted was to crawl into bed and sob. There were guards outside. The neighbors would hear. Twilight was still so new to the throne. Everypony needed to know that she was still there, ready to catch her if she fell. She couldn't shake that image, not yet. Maybe not ever. A tickle of familiar magic washed over her. Luna's horn painted the walls with it's azure glow. A tight field that melded into every surface, pulsed twice, then faded from sight. A soundproofing spell. Neighbors and guards alike went about their business, none the wiser. To them, Celestia would stay just as she'd always been: Beautiful and timeless. Nopony saw her legs fold beneath her like a house of cards. Nopony watched Luna rush to embrace her just in time to break her fall. Nopony heard her wails for what could never be.
