Twilight gazes tiredly out the window, watching as trees and bushes zoom through her sight. Her eyes lazily follow the outline of Ponyville, slowly shrinking into the distance as the train begins its ascent up the slope of Canterlot Mountain. It really wasn't that long ago that she first moved there, and now she has to move away again. At least, just for a little while.

It's always a strange feeling, watching one's home vanish in the distance. She's left her home many times already, first when she moved into Celestia's school, then when she moved to the observatory, and then to Ponyville. Even after that, she's gone back to Canterlot a few times for various reasons. But every time, her thoughts would be held by a dilemma that she could research with her head in a book, or by her friends keeping her mood up with their silly antics.

This time, her friends aren't around to keep her thoughts off the oncoming problem.

And this time, she knows next to nothing of this problem. Barely any hints or clues, no prior knowledge on things going wrong with Princess Celestia, and with much of the Princess's past kept vague or outright missing from the archives, all she can really do is let her mind wander as the scenery shifts and morphs before her. Though, even that she finds difficult with this looming 'threat to national security', as Princess Luna called it.

She sighs tiredly and, without shifting her view, begins sifting through her saddlebag with her magic for one of her books, maybe a fictional one to let her mind immerse more. A. K. Yearling just recently published her newest entry to the Daring Do saga, Daring Do and the Sapphire Stone, and it's the only one she hasn't read yet. She feels her aura brush against it and wraps her magic around it to—

"Why didn't you sa—?"

"Gah!" Twilight shouts, gasping as her magic jerks upwards before abruptly cutting off. Her precious book flies through the air, which she catches before it could smack Lyra's face, followed soon by the entire saddlebag tumbling to the floor in a painful clang.

Both of their ears reflexively splay against the sides of their heads from the noise, and they peek behind their seat to the other side of the train car. If they had heard it, their two royal passengers don't make any show of noticing.

"Oh my gosh, I'm so sorry about that, Twilight! I—"

"No no." Twilight chuckles quietly. "That was my fault. I got so distracted when we started moving, I completely forgot you were here." Her horn flares with its signature violet glow as her saddlebag and spilled books float back to their place on the opposite seat. "Did you... still want to talk about those newer spells I've learned?" She returns her Daring Do book to the bag, and floats out a somewhat larger tome in front of her, flipping through pages rapidly. "If you did, I have plenty of—"

Lyra places a hoof on the book and gently pushes it down to look into Twilight's eyes. Twilight catches her gaze, seeing the same curious look from their conversation on the way to the train station, but accompanied with a trace of... sadness. "I—, no, but thanks."

Twilight tilts her head, confused by the sudden change in expression. "Are... you alright? What's wrong?"

"Why didn't you say anything?" Lyra blurts out suddenly.

Twilight blinks. "...saaaayyy anything about what?"

Lyra returns the blink. "Oh, uh, sorry. I'd been saying it in my head for a while." She turns away briefly to clear her throat. "When you moved here. I... well, I kinda figured you had moved here during the Summer Sun Celebration when I saw you at town hall, then later on when we were celebrating Princess Luna's return."

"Oh?" Twilight looks up in thought. "I hadn't officially moved to Ponyville yet at first, I was just there since Princess Celestia wanted me to oversee the preparations for the Summer Sun Celebration since it'd been years since it was last hosted there. She wanted to make sure it went smoothly and, well, I guess she also wanted me to make friends."

Lyra's gaze falls to the floor. "Friends, huh?"

"Yep!" Twilight beams. "You know, the other Elements? Applejack, Rainbow Dash, Pi—"

"I remember, I know them all too."

"Oh." Twilight pauses, her train of thought screeching to a halt from being cut off. She takes note of Lyra no longer watching her. "Is... something wro—"

"So, Princess Celestia wanted you to make friends, right?"

Twilight's brows furrow in thought, trying to make sense of where the conversation was heading. "Y— yeah?"

Lyra returns her gaze to Twilight's, her eyes. "So what were we then?"

"Huh?" Twilight recoils from the directness of the question. "What do you mea—"

"Us. You know, Lemon Hearts, Twinkleshine, Minuette, Moondancer? Me? Weren't we your friends?"

"Of course you were! Are!" Twilight shakes her head, her brain tripping over her own words. "Of course you're all still my friends!"

"So why didn't you say anything when you left?"

"I—" Twilight hesitates, her mind racing to recall the events of that one faithful day. She remembers sitting on that hill, idly reading through the copy Predictions and Prophecies Princess Celestia sent her earlier that day. She remembers scrambling up the stairs desperately to get a letter out to her warning of Nightmare Moon. She remembers herself and Spike waving goodbye to Shining Armor as their chariot took off for Ponyville. And... and... "I— I could've swore I told one of you before I—"

"You didn't." Lyra affirms. "And don't you remember? You couldn't have told me when you left anyway cause I moved to Ponyville a couple of months before you did. I was so excited to see you again, but you... never came to visit me. I even went by the library once to talk to you a few weeks after, but there just happened to be a storm that afternoon and you quickly sent us all home."

"I..." Twilight looks away. "I remember that day, that was when I had Applejack and Rarity stay over to make it through that storm. And... when a tree fell through the window."

"Did you know the others back in Canterlot only learned of you moving because I told them on my last visit? They still thought you were on some extended assignment from Princess Celestia." Lyra's ears droop. "Moondancer was devastated."

"Moondancer..." Twilight's eyes widen, the name smacking her mind like a brick to the face. "I— how is she doing?" She pauses, her ears falling. "How is everyone else doing? How... how are you doing?"

Lyra laughs quietly. "Oh, don't worry about me, there's nothing else interesting with me other than what I told you on our way here. That was the first time I've really got to catch up with you since you came to Ponyville. Actually, I caught up with Spike pretty early on when I ran into him at the library while you and the girls were out fighting a dragon or something." She turns her gaze forward, letting her sights fall lazily on Twilight's saddlebag. "Minuette and Twinkleshine are still studying magic. Lemon Hearts shifted her focus to management, she wants to work at Canterlot Palace one day."

"Oh?" Twilight puts on as much a smile as she can. "That's... great to hear! I didn't know Lemon Hearts was interested in that sort of thing. Uh, what about Moondancer?"

Lyra sighs. "I... don't really know."

Twilight tilts her head. "What do you mea—"

"Ever since you left, the others said she joins them less and less for hanging out." Lyra looks down to the floor. "I know she studies magic still, but way more aggressively now. She's always filling her schedule with classes she doesn't need for graduation and won't tell any of us why. She also... doesn't smile as much as she used to."

"Oh." Twilight closes her eyes, bringing to light all the times she would rant on and on about a new theorem or equation she'd learned about in magic. And every time, while everypony else quickly occupy themselves with something else out of boredom, Moondancer would always give her full attention, eyes wide and eager, a cheerful grin on her face once she finished. "That bad?"

Lyra nods silently.

Twilight hangs her head, a pang of guilt coursing through her. "I'm sorry... I— I don't know. I was all caught up in warning the Princess about Nightmare Moon. And I— I didn't even know I was going to live there permanently until... until I didn't want to leave anymore."

Lyra chuckles. "If it makes you feel any better, none of us blamed you for moving. I mean, you're one of the Elements of Harmony now. It's pretty much for the sake of protecting us all from more evil monsters that you'd need to stay near the other Elements. And it's not like we weren't used to you kinda bailing on our plans because you got sucked into some research project almost all the time. I just... wish you did say something."

"I know, I..." Twilight pauses, her eyes darting between the seat in front of her, to the ceiling, to a grate on the wall, to the ceiling again, back to the floor as her mind races to find the right words. "I should've sent a letter when I— no, I should've at least told you all. It just didn't... cross my mind at the time, and I'm sorry."

Her eyes fall back to her saddlebag, resting upon the corner of a framed picture that she knows holds the image of her and five now very dear ponies. Her ears perk back up.

"Princess Celestia didn't just send me to Ponyville to make friends. She sent me there to learn about friendship. And... I'm still learning about it, what it means to be a good friend. So hopefully now, I can be a better one to the rest of you too?" Twilight offers a weak smile to Lyra. Much to her relief, she returns a much warmer one.

"Spike tells me you've been sending a letter to the Princess every Tuesday about some friendship lesson you've learned. I guess now you can, like you used to say all the time during class, 'apply your findings', right?"

Twilight pauses, the expression triggering an avalanche of memories, and snickers. "Yeah, yeah. Maybe when we have time, we can have another get-together. I'm a lot better now at actually talking during one of those instead of burying my head in a book."

Lyra feigns a shocked gasp, to which Twilight rolls her eyes. "Twilight actually talking to us face to face instead of through a book?! It's gotta be the end of days!" She chuckles. "Good luck finding time for that now, while Princess Luna has us all sworn to secrecy over Fake Celestia over there."

"What."

Twilight's jaw hangs open. Lyra's eyes widen in panic, quickly shoving a hoof into Twilight's mouth before she could say anything else. "Ahhh, I guess Princess Luna hadn't told you what we're dealing with yet." She cautiously glances behind her, confirming that the midnight alicorn was still staring lazily out the window. "She did say to not discuss it until we were at the palace, and I reaaallly don't want to get on her bad side after that scare she gave me at my house."

Twilight slowly pulls Lyra's hoof off of her with a playful eye roll. "Alright, fine. I Pinkie Promise to not bother you about it until Luna lets us."

Lyra just laughs and turns to face forward again. Twilight's eyes shift back to her saddlebag, ready to seek out a book to read, when she's stopped by a hoof-poke to her side.

"Actually... could you tell me some more about those newer spells?"

Tearing her gaze from the window, Luna lets out a long breath and looks down to where her mane sits lazily beside her. Already it moves slightly more than it had when they departed Ponyville, a good and expected sign of her magic's restoration. She sweeps her gaze tiredly across the train car.

Her guards remain idle at the far end of the compartment, their eyes following the outside scenery through the windows. Lyra and Twilight are locked in some deep conversation that she hasn't the energy to try eavesdropping on. Not that she was really planning to. Celestia used to advise her against eavesdropping when they were fillies, something she always found ironic given how often she herself would eavesdrop on Starswirl and their guards for any little interesting tidbits between their studying.

And then there was... not-Celestia.

The impossible imposter.

She narrows her eyes at the figure wearing her sister's form flawlessly. If not for what she felt when the imposter teleported away from the library, she would not have hesitated to blast the fake from the face of Equus the moment she laid eyes on it at Lyra's place. That, and collateral damage in combat was something her sister deeply frowned upon and accosted her many a time in the past.

She would probably not be too happy with what she'd done to Star Swirl the Bearded's wing of the Archives.

Still, a very small bubble of anger threatens to burst from within just from looking at her sister's form, but she shoves it back deep within. She will need to tread carefully from now on, lest she risk losing the real Celestia.

Careful not to rouse the sleeping figure of her sister, Luna slides herself off the seat and trots over to the middle of the car, where her and Celestia's enchanted cloaks hang loosely from one of the glass dividers. Reaching out a hoof, she grasps her own cloak, feeling the invisible threads of magic weaved within the fabric. She places her hoof on the centerpiece of her cutie mark, where the magic is the most focused. She closes her eyes and widens her senses, brushing lightly against the familiar feel of her sister's magic intertwined with her own, tracing out the intricate matrix for a complex invisibility and tracking spell. She remembers when the two of them worked on the enchantment, the first time they'd constructed a spell together.

Even as young as they were, the magic of two alicorns is nothing to laugh at, remaining strong enough to keep an enchantment fully functioning after over a millennia.

She moves the cloak around until she finds the hood and peers into the back of it, finding a message that would take the heat deep within an active volcano to burn away.

So we may never lose each other.
- Tia

Luna breathes in deep, soothing her emotions as she focuses her thoughts far back before any of them had to worry about anything but themselves and each other. She feels a tear begin to form, but she quickly wipes it away before it can form a trail.

"You lost me once, sister. And then you found me," she whispered. "Now I will find you."

"No matter what it takes."

Author's Note

Yup, that's right! Thanks to our human friend's entrance, some things from the show no longer occur in their original order, so keep a look out for things! And because this starts just after the season 2 premiere, Twilight's memories of her old friends are still fresher

This was supposed to come last week, but I was a bit low on energy. Next chapter will be next week, so you won't have to wait for long!