Zen and the Art of Horizontal Refreshment

I stepped back into the room with Luna and sat on my haunches. Luna looked at me expectantly. Second after second passed as I struggled to speak. The longer I remained silent, the more awkward it seemed, the more anxious I got, and the harder it became to speak. Within a few moments, I started silently panicking, my eyes going wide.

What if she can't accept it? What if she thinks I'm a freak? What if she thinks I took advantage of our little ponies? What if she never wants to see me again?

Wait...even worse... What if she likes it? What if she wants to do it too? What if she wants to take advantage of our little ponies? What if she wants to...do it together?

Ugh. I looked at Luna, and she raised an eyebrow, still waiting for me to speak. I had to tell her. I looked down and began...

"I--"

I can't do this!

"What I--"

So gross! So weird! So wrong!!

"The problem was--"

Too gross! Too weird! TOO WRONG! ABORT!!

"I can't do this!"

I looked up at Luna again, and she smiled. Not derisively, like before, but like the smile you give a young foal who's dropped their ice cream. "Now, Tia," she lectured, "you have to tell me some time."

"I know, just...not here. Just--just come with me."

I had a plan. I knew what could ease the awkwardness! I would simply have to enact Phase 1 of the Royal Equestrian Breeding Regimen. I trotted down the corridor with Luna in tow, almost giddy that I had a way to get all of this off my chest easily!

Luna followed closely, looking perplexed. "Where are we going?"

I leaned over and whispered, "To the Chamber Sub Rosa."

"And what is that?"

"It's-- It's part of the answer. You'll see."

We made our way down the spiral stair of the spire that held the royal quarters. We headed down the corridor toward the throne room, but I surprised Luna when I made a right a few feet before the large arched doors, gliding straight through a solid wall. I looked back through the illusion, semi-transparent from this side, to see her smirk.

"You've certainly gotten better at illusions in the last thousand years," she said, stepping through after me.

"Necessity," I replied, declining to elaborate.

We continued down the narrow, smooth tunnel as it sloped downward. Unlike most of the castle, I personally bored this tunnel with my magic. The walls transitioned from stone to glass as we passed through the crystalline foundation of Canterlot.

"No guards?" Luna asked.

"No need," I replied, "No other pony alive knows about this place, and security is quite tight."

As I said this, we passed out of the crystalline layer, and a myriad of magical fields swept Luna and I, verifying our identities, and therefore not dousing us with a mixture of fuel and adhesive, not igniting the concoction, not cleaving the remains into hundreds of hoof-sized pieces, not atomizing the remaining equine briquettes with a massive artificial gravity well, not transporting the pony vapor into the center of the sun, and certainly not forwarding the resulting plasma into the black hole at the center of the galaxy.

Luna quickly decoded the ward's design, and nodded. "I see."

Now below the foundation to the city, the sloping corridor transitioned from crystal to smooth pearlescent stone. Eventually, we reached a dead end---a wall covered in a complex series of runes of my own design. I casually ignited a few with my horn, and the tunnel filled with the sound of grinding -- a hidden stone mechanism groaning to life. I was quietly giddy that I was finally getting to show off all this to somepony who could actually appreciate it. Sure, when we got to the bottom, we'd have to talk about...that stuff. But until then, it had been a thousand years and I was finally getting to reveal the most sophisticated, secure, and secret location ever constructed in this history of ponykind!

After a few moments, the rune-covered wall slid aside, revealing a wide cylindrical room with a clear crystal floor. I stepped forward, looking down through the floor at the dark shaft extending as far as the eye could see. Luna reluctantly joined me on the platform.

"Some sort of magical hoist?" she asked.

"Yes, it goes all the way down to the base of the mountain."

"Oh, sister. What have you done? What could be so horrible that could justify all this?"

"You shall see, I'm afraid." After a few moments, the granite door slid back into place. The crystal platform began descending, steadily picking up speed, gently humming at a steadily increasing pitch as it went. My pride turned to dread. I knew that in seconds and we would be in the Chamber Sub Rosa, and I'd have to come clean. My only solace was that I knew that Phase 1 would be there to help me. Sweet, delicious Phase 1.

Soon the platform began to slow as it approached the subterranean complex within the base of the mountain. One side of the tunnel gave way to a modest chamber about the size of my quarters. It was simply furnished with a dining table and kitchen area, with doors leading off to the...other area. Along the far wall were lined dozens of sturdy oak barrels. The platform came to a stop, and Luna and I stepped into the room.

"Well?" Luna asked expectantly.

"Sister, welcome to the Chamber Sub Rosa. This is the site of the Royal Equestrian Breeding Project," I replied.

"This is it? A kitchen? Well, now can you at least tell me what this is all about? What have you been doing down here?"

"Not yet. I need to...conduct Phase 1."

"And 'Phase 1' is...?" Luna asked, her patience wearing thin.

"Phase 1 is where I drink copious amounts of liquor so I don't think too much about the other phases."

Luna smirked. "You? With alcohol? 'Princess Teatotaler', 'Dry Celly', 'Queen of the Buzzkill' has a secret liquor cabinet? Is that what all this is for? Just so you can get drunk?"

"No! This is just the first step. And besides, unlike you, I still maintain that a princess has no business becoming intoxicated in front of her subjects!"

Luna rolled her eyes. "I'm glad your title remains untarnished, my Queen."

I ignored her, stepping over to the rows of barrels. Given that alcohol was involved, I knew she would not be more than a step behind. Using my magic, I fetched a tankard from the nearby cabinet and levitated it under the spigot of my latest favorite, a recent vintage of Sweet Apple Acres' hard apple cider. As I went to open the valve, I looked over to see Luna's eyes wide, scanning the imprint on each barrel.

Her mouth dropped open, and she spoke with a faraway look in her eyes. "So. Beautiful. You have every liquor ever here!"

"Yes, it took me so long to find one I could tolerate. The rest have been just sitting down here."

"Tia, you have spirits down here almost a thousand years old?"

"Yes, it's such a waste. Especially the wine...I sampled quite a bit of it in the beginning, trying to find one I liked, and I'm ashamed to say that it's just been sitting here, probably going bad. I guess I just don't like wine."

"You have thousand-year-old wine down here?"

"Yes...? I don't exactly have a drain to pour it out down here."

"Tia, I love you!" She leapt forward and wrapped her forelegs around me.

I was so happy to feel Luna's embrace I nearly dropped my mug! "Oh, Luna, I love you, too. But why are you so happy about this?"

"Tia, wine ages. Old wine is delicious and valuable. And millennium-old wine is unheard of! Quick, what's the oldest cask here?"

I thought back a long ways to when I built this room. After a bit of consideration, I remembered rolling the very first barrel into place, filling a glass, sipping a bit of it, and pouring the rest into the wash basin. "Bottom-left barrel. It should be about...995 years old now."

Luna giddily summoned a wine glass from the cabinet and held it under the spigot. Together, we filled our respective vessels.

Luna held her glass aloft. "To reconciliation! Cheers!"

I smiled broadly and levitated my mug up to clink her glass. "Cheers."

We both drank deeply. The cider tickled on the way down, and the sweetness of the apple masked the sting of the alcohol. I looked up at Luna...her wolfish grin had returned.

"Sister," she said, "I think I know what you replaced breeding with now!"

I blanched for a moment...she couldn't know!

"Because this," she continued, holding her glass aloft, "is better than sex!"

"Luna!" I cried.

"Oh, lighten up, Tia!"

I sighed deeply. "I am." I indulged myself in another another deep draft of cider. "I am."

"Then answers?" she asked.

"Then answers."