Princess Luna, the keeper of the night, kept a quick pace along the darkened halls of Canterlot Castle.
She was alone, and for that she was thankful. She didn't want any pony else to see this.
Her ears perked up in alarm as a sound echoed across the marble royal walls of the dark castle protected in her moonlight, a wail, a cry of deep pain.
She increased her pace, her heart rate jumped as her ears fell in growing unease.
Death.
Death was a subject Luna had tried hard to suppress as her long life moved forward. As a mortal, she had some comfort in the fact that life did come to an end, generations would have moved on without even a whisper of her name, but fate played a rather cruel trick.
Her sister and herself were not so lucky. They turned into Alicorns, they soon watched as their generation moved on. Everypony who knew them as their mortal selves soon no longer breathed life. Then all that was left were alicorn-worshipping fools.
The sisters avoided talking about such a subject, as life went on and more and more ponies fell to it's undeniable hold, they knew there was no end for them unless the universe itself ceased to exist. There was no point in discussing grief, they had already said all that could be said by the time 200 years had passed in their reign.
Until Nightmare Moon, of course.
The first time she was defeated, Luna awoke on the moon, she felt it was confirmation Alicorns were doomed to live in immortality. It was a soul-crushing realization.
Then, 1000 years passed, she returned to Equestria, fueled by rage, fueled by the need to exist, to be known even.
Then, when the elements slammed into Nightmare Moon, she experienced something she never thought she would.
Death.
For a few blissful moments, as the elements dug into her body, ripping it apart in light, she felt pain followed by nothing.
Nightmare Moon was dead.
Strangely enough, she had only felt that sensation once before...only once...when she became an alicorn.
Then, her mind was put back together, her body once again being her own as her eyes flickered open to a damaged castle, pain slammed into her.
Reminding her of who she was.
Now, as she moved along the halls of Canterlot Castle, she couldn't ignore death.
It was coming for them all.
It already got her sister.
Hence, the deep sobbing up ahead.
About a year and a half before, the Crystal Empire came back, followed by Sombra. Her sister sent her student, and her friends to the empire with complete confidence she would pass "the test."
Twilight panicked but went ahead anyway to ensure she saved an empire and passed the test.
Luna wasn't quite sure what occurred during those days, something about a festival, a fake crystal heart and then finally a spark of hope when they found the real one in the tower.
After that, according to the official report, Twilight became trapped up there, Spike attempted to grab the heart but it fell off the side of the tower just as the shield protecting the city fell.
Princess Cadance didn't have the strength to move anymore from her spell, Twilight's brother galloped to inform guards to fight for the city, for their freedom. Twilight's friends scattered between staying with Cadance, calming down citizens or fighting however they could.
It didn't matter in the end, King Sombra snatched the tumbling heart right out of the sky.
Soon, everything was the way it was 1000 years ago.
Through a miracle, Twilight, her friends, Shinning Armour and his wife Cadance managed to escape before they could be taken captive once again and then headed to Canterlot.
Twilight knew she failed, well failed is a strong word but that didn't stop the young unicorn from crawling into a ball through endless panic attacks on the train back from saying it despite everyone's insistence it wasn't her fault. Sometimes the enemy is just too strong.
When they all returned, Twilight couldn't even look her mentor in the eyes. Princess Celestia couldn't look down at her student either. Both of their thoughts were clouded by grief, rage at themselves, at Sombra, and deep pain for the whole event.
Twilight requested she be transferred back to Canterlot, to stay secluded and alone for her failure with the expectation Celestia would drop her as her student.
Celestia couldn't give the order to fulfill such punishment as she and Luna knew fully well she did not deserve that, but Celestia also couldn't ignore it either when the history of Equestria's preservation board came to finally demand a stained glass window in the main hall to the throne room of the responding tragedy that was the Crystal Empire's return.
She and Luna argued with the board for hours against it, but in the end, they could not deny that it was a large piece of history they couldn't ignore. Especially since all combat reports from the edge of the border were reporting that a war was brewing.
So the window was commissioned, followed by the unveiling a week later. Celestia invited as few ponies as she possibly could, she made sure Twilight and her friends didn't have to see it, at least for now.
By the end of the week, King Sombra declared war. It was all the press could talk about. All anypony could talk about. Twilight shut herself away with loyal Spike on her side in her old observatory, not even her friends could convince her to return to Ponyville.
Months started to pass, and her sister's guilt grew more and more as the casualty reports came in. The sisters briefly considered sending the Elements of Harmony once again to try to use their ancient power but Celestia wasn’t sure the idea could work. Twilight had been locked herself away for months, sending Spike out for essentials and to shoo off the attempts of her friends to bring her home.
Meanwhile, Celestia hadn’t been able to find a way to help the young unicorn despite her years of knowledge so she allowed her guilt to drown her words, to become a shell of herself that soon moved through the halls of Canterlot with barely a glance to anypony but Luna.
Then, suddenly, she was gone one night. She took her armour, hidden deep inside the Catacombs. She left a simple note for Luna to not worry, she was headed to the front lines of the war.
Luna wanted to be in charge, but not like this. Ruling alone was Nightmare Moon's plan, not herself and yet here she was.
A week later, she stood on the throne, hearing from one of the top generals of the Equestrian military when suddenly she felt as if a part of her soul was ripped out. She gasped for breath as the general looked up at her with concern.
Suddenly the whole world felt wrong.
About an hour later she received a scroll from Cadance as she paced her balcony, becoming increasingly worried about the sun failing to rise from the north.
The scroll, laced with shed tears recounted a short story. They retook the empire, Cadance and Shinning managed to get the heart back to its rightful place as Celestia battled Sombra in the throne room.
Of course, it was too late. King Sombra slammed a sword with corrupted dark magic straight into Celestia's heart, the poison spread quickly just as the heart was placed on its pedestal.
Her sister was dead.
Dead.
Even Alicorns had their limits.
The news spread like wildfire. By morning, her death was already being written in the newspapers. Ponies demanded answers as to what had happened. How could an alicorn die?
The first thing Luna did was fly over to an observatory and knock softly on the door. It opened a crack to reveal Spike, looking up at her with a sad but tired smile.
"H-Hi Princess Luna." Spike said before confusion crossed his face. He was probably wondering why she was there when a new day needed to be started...or why her eyes were bloodshot with tears.
"Hello Spike, I must speak with you and T-Twilight." Luna replied, her voice shaking from pain. Spike nodded silently before opening the door a little more to allow her inside.
The pair soon moved through the dark observatory to the main area where a large hourglass stood, surrounded by walls of books, littered between the selves and piles on the ground. In the middle of it all, leaning against her desk as she scribbles notes nonstop about magical theory, her horn providing the only light outside of the moonlight streaming through the massive windows, sat Twilight Sparkle.
Dishevelled. Lost.
Luna was beginning to wish she had waited to come break the news, that perhaps she should have called the friends she had been turning away for weeks for comfort.
It was too late now as Twilight looked up from her studies with bags under her eyes, a messy mane, and bloodshot eyes.
"Princess Luna?" She mumbled before her eyes widened and she stood at attention. "W-What are you...How can I help you?"
"I have some news I need to share with you before...it becomes common knowledge tomorrow." Luna hesitantly explained before she motioned for Spike to stand beside Twilight. Twilight began to tremble as she assumed her life as a student had finally come to an end.
In reality, it was much worse than that.
"I received a letter from Cadance, the war is over. King Sombra has been defeated." Twilight flinched before giving a small hopeful smile. The first sign of happiness since the whole mess started. Luna felt tears pricking her eyes again as she sucked in a deep breath and took a few steps closer to the unicorn.
"Twilight Sparkle, Spike, I regret...I regret to inform you that m-my sister, Princess C-Celestia is dead. King Sombra murdered her before the crystal heart was returned to the pedestal."
Horrified expressions were plastered on the pairs' faces as they took the information in. Several moments passed without a sound being uttered.
"Twilight, my sister cared for you very much, she-"
"No." Twilight suddenly snapped back before stumbled back towards the safety of her desk, of her books. "No, no, no. Alicorns don't die. She...she must be somewhere...she can't..."
"Twilight, I am sorry but she is."
"No!" She barked back, rage fueling her frantic motions as she grabbed a quill and began to resume her writing. Tears poured down her face as she tried to deny Luna's words. "Alicorns don't die. They just can't."
That was three months ago. The funeral, a grand funeral took place about a month later. They had taken Celestia’s body from the crystal castle to be taken home, and laid to rest in the Canterlot Gardens.
Everypony in Equestria tried to be there…Expect Twilight.
Twilight’s mind had snapped as Spike claimed, it was the only way he could describe what happened to a pony who was practically his sister. She didn’t want to believe reality anymore. All she did was study, study and more studying. No pony was sure of even what she bothered to learn anymore. All her notes, littered across the observatory, barely made any sense.
Her friends always tried to get her to come out, even for an hour, they didn’t know who she was anymore, which was making that process harder as the weeks went on.
That’s why Luna was hurrying through the castle. Her sister was dead, her sister’s student was broken and Luna knew the source of that sobbing. Her magic flared as she opened one of the double doors leading to the throne room where the sobbing was unmistakable.
She lightly shut the door, taking in slow breaths as she passed the windows, which depicted her banishments as Nightmare Moon. She came to a stop as in the dark hallway, illuminated by the window itself and Luna’s own magic to provide light, was Twilight Sparkle clutching her sister’s feather. A feather that she gave to Twilight as a foal to use for notes when she ran out of quills one night.
As Luna’s eyes adjusted to the scene, she looked up at the window, the window depicting the return of the Crystal Empire. She wanted nothing more than to smash it into a million pieces.
Twilight faced away from the window, curled into a ball as she held the feather. Luna saw movement out of the corner of her eyes, her head snapped in alarm to see Spike standing near one of the pillars farther in the hallway, eyes pleading for her to help, for her to do anything.
“She can’t be dead, she can’t be dead.”
Luna couldn’t let out a single word, she didn’t know what else to say, she already said everything that could be uttered on the matter. She carefully unfolded her wing to stretch it around Twilight before moving herself to curl up next to her as Twilight unintentionally leaned into the hug.
Luna’s own eyes filled with tears as grief from memories of her sister came flooding back as Twilight’s wails of denial crashed against the walls, her head drifted down to look down at the feather Twilight wouldn’t let go of, a large pure white feather from Celestia and a faint stain of ink at the base of it from long study sessions, the only quill in Equestria that never broke.
The last piece of her sister that wasn’t locked away in a museum or buried 6 feet in the ground, locked away from the sun Celestia cared for so much.
She looked towards the elements bearer of magic. The shaking unicorn had proven herself to have incredible power, her sister had hinted at such a possibility before she sent Twilight away to the Crystal Empire.
A power that could just as easily turn sinister. She wouldn’t be able to survive much longer if she didn’t overcome the grief she was locked into. Denial wouldn’t bring her sister back, death was inevitable.
Luna’s body stiffened as the only answer occurred to her, Ponyville. Ponyville is what took her out of her isolation. She came to Canterlot for punishment, she stayed so she could hide from the world. Celestia didn’t give her a choice when she sent her off to that town. Luna didn’t know how else to save her.
She gulped before nudging the unicorn, Twilight looked back at her with exhausted eyes, cheeks stained with tears from weeks of grief.
“In the morning, I will be issuing a direct order for you and Spike to return to Ponyville, your home.” Luna whispered. Twilight’s expression crossed between anger and fear as she processed her words.
“No, I-I can find a way to fix this-”
“Twilight!” Luna barked, causing Spike and Twilight to flinch. “My sister is dead. She was buried in Canterlot Gardens among the heroes who protected this land. I may be an Alicorn but death comes for us all, but it's not as if she never existed. She left this land, this country to thrive for generations to come. A land we must protect or we would be throwing away what a beautiful peace she left us.”
Twilight lowered her head, ashamed.
“She sent you to Ponyville for a reason, you were her student for a reason. Yes, mistakes occurred during the Crystal Empire, but not once, not once even after those events did my sister doubt who you are. She knew you did not mean for what occurred to happen. She chose to go to the front lines, she chose to walk into that throne room and battle Sombra. She is gone, I will miss her every day, every time I must change the day and night alone I will miss her, but life goes on, just as it will continue long after we are gone.”
Spike took a step towards the pair with a small smile of hope as Twilight’s eyes poured with tears again as she wanted to deny again, pleaded with her silently to give her any hope that the sun alicorn wasn’t gone, but when she was met with Luna’s own heavy silence as an answer, they both knew denial was only making the matter worse. She couldn’t fix it with a time spell, she couldn’t rewrite reality, and she certainly couldn’t resurrect the dead.
“I miss her.” Twilight choked out with a strangled sob. Luna pulled her closer as her eyes fell to the other windows surrounding them. Twilight began to quiet down as her eyes widened and she looked up to the older alicorn with alarm. “W-What are you going to do now?”
Luna had been trying to avoid that line of thinking since her sister’s death occurred, her only family left alive was dead. She didn’t have the kind of relationship her sister did with Cadance, she felt alone. She felt disconnected.
“I will continue with my duties, I will do my best to fulfill what my sister wished for Equestria, which includes her faithful student. Once you recover.” Luna replied softly, Twilight nodded, her eyes were as uncertain of the future as Luna was. But, for now, that didn’t matter. “My sister wouldn’t want this, she would want us to move forward towards a brighter future. Which is why you must return to Ponyville, perhaps visit your family once more before you leave?”
Twilight sucked in a deep breath and swiped her hoof over her eyes before glancing towards Spike.
“Does that sound like a good plan, Spike? I am sure Shinning Armour would like to see us before we go.”
Spike nodded slowly with a smile. Twilight couldn’t help but chuckle through the tears.
THE END
Author's Note
I am a little out of practice in writing but sometimes I do very short stories for my art as inspiration and this story just happened to be a little longer than I originally intended/normally write these days so I decided it was better to be placed here! Hope you enjoyed it, have a good day!
