Project Celestiaby decembuaryChaptersUpgradeSettling InPlansLettersPrincessesWeatherSistersSisterhooves socialCutie marks and cupcakes Part 1Cutie marks and cupcakes Part 2Flight LessonsUpgradeI nervously approached the doors to the royal court room. Through the wooden barrier the two Alicorn Princesses held my fate in their hooves. I was really beginning to regret ‘borrowing’ those cupcakes from Sugarcube Corner. “Guards, bring to me the unicorn Moon Dust” a voice commanded from inside the room. Two of the Royal guards opened the huge door and summoned for me to come in. I slowly stepped in through the doors. The royal court room was nothing like I had expected it to be. The floors and walls were marble and in the middle of the room, leading to the front was a long red carpet. The windows were the most spectacular thing about the room though. Each window was a stained glass picture portraying moments from the history of Equestria. I recognized the Elements of Harmony defeating Nightmare Moon and Discord, but the rest of the windows showed events that I didn’t know about. I figured they were from a long time ago. “Moon Dust, you are brought here today be trailed for the stealing of one of Miss Pinkie Pie’s cupcakes. Are you guilty of the accused crime?" Said Princess Celestia, her voice projecting all through the room. “Yes, I am guilty of the Crime” I replied. “That’s good. I couldn’t let someone who wasn’t honest rule New Equestria” Now that was unexpected. “Rule New Equestria? What do you mean by that?” I asked. “You think I brought you here for stealing a cupcake? That would be ridiculous! I have been watching you for some time now, stealing the cupcake was just an excuse to bring you here” The Princess explained. “The real reason you are here is because Equestria is over-crowded” “But what can I do about that? My special talent is architecture, not solving the problems of Equestria!” “You can solve this problem by becoming a princess and leading 180 ponies to a new Equestria on the other side of this planet. There will be 90 mares and 90 stallions, 30 of each type of pony. You can decide on the type of place it will be. It could be an underwater world, a desert, rainforest - Anything! You will also have one creature of your choice defending all of the ponies there because I cannot guarantee it will be entirely safe.” Replied the Princess. “Are you willing to do this?” “Yes, I am Princess” “Then I will start the process of turning you into an Alicorn” I braced myself, preparing for whatever might be coming at me. Suddenly a wave of magic surged through my body, it felt like a million ants burrowing from the tip of my horn and digging through my flesh. I kept my mouth clamped shut, refusing to scream but my attempts were fruitless and I ended up screaming. And then it was over. I stood up, I must have fallen onto the floor during the transformation. When I was standing I noticed that I was now a lot taller. Not quite as tall as Princess Celestia, but close. “Oh good, it worked” Princess Celestia said happily. She floated a mirror up to me so I could see my new look. My face now looked like Celestia’s, but still slightly rounder. My Purple mane was a lot longer than before, it sparkled and billowed about, as if it was blowing in a non-existent wind. In the mirror I noticed two feathery wings folded against my sides. I stretched out my new appendages. They were the same colour as my body, except the grey feathers were shimmering and sparkling, while the fur on my body just stayed the same. “Wow” I said, still staring at my reflection. I looked up at the Princess and noticed that while I had been examining myself, she had been summoning some jewelry very similar to hers. “These are for you. A princess must dress like a princess” She levitated a large gold collar with sapphires embedded in it forwards and fitted it around my neck. Next she lifted a a crown of the same colours onto my head. She than indicated for me to step into the four gold shoes in front of me. The jewelry was quite heavy, but I was sure I would get used to it. Once I was wearing attire appropriate for a princess, she summoned for a small yellow and green baby dragon to come into the room. “This is Leafy. She is going to be your assistant, advisor and friend. She is also your way of communicating with me.” Said the white Alicorn. “Think of the type of scenery you want New Equestria to have when you are being teleported. Any questions before you go” “Yes, just one Princess- “Please call me Celestia, after all you are a princess now too.” “Okay, but you said earlier that there would be a creature to defend New Equestria” “Yes, I did. Tell me now what you would like” “Okay. Can I please have an Ursa?” “Minor or Major?” “Minors grow up into Majors, right? “Yes, they do” “In that case, I will have an Ursa Minor” “As you wish” Celestia said. “Your Ursa and your people will be waiting for you when you arrive. Are you ready to go?” “I am as ready as I’ll ever be” “Okay then. Off you go” A huge pink light flooded the room. It was all I could see for a few moments and then suddenly I was in a forest surrounded by 180 ponies, a baby dragon and a tame Ursa Minor. Settling InThe ponies surrounding me had no idea what was going on. “What is this place?” “Where am I?” “Help! There’s an Ursa major” “Who is that?” “You’re a princess! Explain to us what’s going on!” “Okay” I replied to nopony in particular. “Listen up everypony!” Suddenly the murmuring stopped. Everypony’s eyes were on me. “Princess Celestia has sent us all here because Equestria is over-populated. We are to start a New Equestria right here. The Ursa Minor is here to defend us from whatever is out here. I am the new appointed Princess Moon Dust.” I said, and surprisingly everypony listened. “Any questions?” “What are we supposed to eat, and where are we going to sleep?” I bit my bottom lip. That was the question I knew would come up. I had no answer to that one. “I don’t know yet. For now we will have a team of ponies making huts for us to sleep in until we can work out something more permanent. Pegasi will obviously sleep on the clouds for now. For food, I want to see all ponies who are bakers, chefs - anything to do with food, and maybe together we’ll think of something. All ponies with blue on them, except for the ponies meeting me here are in charge of making huts. The rest of you, make friends or help the ponies with the huts. I want to see someone who is good with animals too.” I said. “Off you go” A group of blue ponies headed off to build huts, while a group of ponies with items of food and cutlery as cutie marks headed towards me. “Okay you lot. Does anyone here know anything about food in the wild?” A few ponies raised their hooves. “Okay you three will tell these ponies what to look for, then gather up as much edible stuff as possible. Where’s my animal expert?” A pale pink earth pony stuck her hoof in the air as the chef ponies left to search for food. “What’s your name?” “Rose” She said. “You are now officially in charge of anything to do with animals. Are you okay with that?” “Yes” “Okay. Do you have any idea what Ursas and Dragons eat?” “Dragons eat gemstones, but they can go for weeks without food. Make sure the dragon doesn’t hoard anything though, it will grow until it’s bigger than a mountain! Ursas don’t eat that much. Ursa Minors drink milk and eat grass and rocks. Ursa Majors eat grass and rocks. Is that any help?” “Thanks for that. You were a huge help” “Not for me though” Said Leafy the dragon. She was standing next to me the whole time. “I like to eat. Now I won’t get to eat anything for ages, because you said I didn’t have to eat for weeks at a time!” “Don’t worry I will feed you as soon as I find a gemstone that we don’t need” “You better” The dragon said while glaring at me. At that moment one of the chef ponies came back from exploring. “Princess Moon Dust. We have found a small patch of apple trees. Can we have some more ponies to help carry the apples back here?” “Yes, take whoever you want” “Thank you Princess” He galloped off to a group of chatting ponies, then galloped off in the direction he came from. The group of ponies followed. “Well, at least we’ll have food tonight” Rose said happily “Yeah. I better go and check on the huts that are being built. Hopefully we’ll have shelter tonight as well” “See you later then?” “Definitely” I headed off towards the group of ponies building huts. Unicorns were telekinetically snapping branches off trees and levitating them towards the ground where the earth ponies leaned them against trees. Another group of unicorns were weaving the long grass into mats and rope. They placed the mats over the branches and tied them on to the lean-to with ropes. They had already made hundreds of little huts. “Good job everypony!” The ponies looked up from their work “We are trying as hard as we can your majesty” One of the hut builders said. “We should be finished very soon.” “Brilliant! I better go see how the pegasi are doing with the clouds” “Okay. We’ll get back to work now” The ponies got back to work. I trotted over to a place where I could see the pegasus working on cloud houses, then I realized I had wings now, and could probably fly. I gave them a quick flap. Unfortunately I still wasn’t used to them, so I couldn’t move them much. I made a mental note to ask one of the Pegasus to teach me to fly. For now I would have make do with just asking how they were doing. “How are the cloud houses coming along?” I shouted out to the pegasus. “Excellently! Why don’t you come up and see?” “I’m afraid I can’t fly yet. Maybe once you are finished with the houses you could ask a pegasus to teach me!” “We’re just about finished now. I will come and teach you in a couple of minutes” “Okay then. See you later!” PlansDear Princess Celestia, It’s hard to believe only a week has past since I arrived here in New Equestria. Already we have found sources of food and water, and we have built makeshift huts. So far there has been nothing harmful here. I have learnt to fly, thanks to my new friend Cumulous, and I will soon learn to control the weather. A brilliant animal expert named Rose has got the Ursa used to its new environment. She has even found it a cave to live in. We are about to start planning a more permanent village, but the Earth ponies need some seeds so we can grow food besides apples. Could you please send some? Yours faithfully, Moon Dust “Send it Leafy” Leafy blew sparkly green fire onto the letter. The letter disappeared as soon as the flame hit it. When Leafy appeared here, she had a bag full of parchment, quills and ink so I can keep in touch with Princess Celestia. I hadn’t put it to much use yet. But that would change today. Today we were going to start planning a permanent village, and divide up land for ponies to make houses and farm. Yesterday the pegasi had mapped out the area from birds eye view, so we could have a map to make dividing land easier. “Leafy, can you please summon the council?” “Sure” Leafy headed off to search for the council. A few days ago, I had decided that I didn’t want to plan everything and lead a country alone, so I had recruited a few trustworthy ponies into a council. The council consisted of: Cumulous - He was in charge of the weather and buildings in the sky. Rose - She deals with any wild animals we might come across, and was in charge of the Ursa. Pumpkin - She’s in charge of anything to do with food. Shadow - A strange unicorn who is very adept at magic. She helps with any big spells or magic stuff. Plum - He’s in charge of all the farming and gardening in New Equestria. Soon the whole crew was gathered in the official meeting hut. (It’s a normal lean-to with more room than a normal hut so it fits more ponies in it!) Now that the council was all here, I spread out the map the Pegasi had made. “We need to divide this land up among 180 ponies, then set markers between each of the ponies properties.” “Well, this map shows 2 million square meters of land, how about we give each pony 10,000 square meters of land. Then there is 200,000 square meters left that we can use for a castle and a school and whatever else we need.” Said Cumulous “That’s a brilliant idea” I said “Yeah, but do the pegasi need land?” Said Pumpkin “Well if you have a better idea I’d like to hear it!” Exclaimed Cumulous Pumpkin stayed silent. “Okay then, all in favour of giving everypony 1 acre of land, raise your hooves!” Everypony’s hooves shot up into the air. “Brilliant” I said. “Now does anypony have any idea how we can divide the land?” “We could build fences” Suggested Rose. “Good idea. Cumulous, take a group of ponies to build fences and measure out the land. I’ll go announce the situation to everypony else” I said. “Council dismissed” Everypony left. I headed out too. When I was outside, I headed towards the clearing where everypony usually hung out. “Attention everypony!” Everypony looked at me. “The council and I have discussed creating a more permanent town and we have decided that everypony will get 10,000 square meters of land. Cumulous and a group of ponies are dividing up the properties now” I announced. “Once the section is divided, I will send you all off to choose a property. You are in charge of anything that happens on your property. If you want to live with another pony, choose properties next to each other and just knock down the fence. Any questions?” There were no questions. “I will tell you when you can choose a property” The next day Cumulous came and told me all the properties were fenced off. “Attention everypony!” I yelled. “The land has been fenced off. You can now choose the place you want to live. Off you go” It only took a second for the clearing to be clear of ponies. LettersA week later, trees had been cleared for everypony’s houses, and some were already half way up. Luckily my idea for a castle didn’t need any trees cleared and my house was nearly complete. My castle was going to be a giant treehouse. A spiral staircase wrapped around the trunk of a huge tree. A huge box room encased the trunk. The tree came up though the house, making a natural centre piece. Rope bridges made a pathway between lots of different trees. All of the trees nearby had been converted into treehouses. My room was in one of the trees furtherest from the centre tree. It had a stunning view of the new town, and it was next to the house that was going to be used as a school. Both my room and the classroom had balconies. “Leafy! Can come here? Bring parchment and a quill.” “Coming” Leafy hurried in through the door. “Take a letter” “Okay” Dear Princess Celestia, Thank you for the seeds you sent. My subjects were delighted. We have started constructing the town. All of the houses are just about finished. Some ponies have even starting planting food. The council and I are trying to think of a name for this new town. It needs to be something fancy, because once we have more towns, this will be the capitol of New Equestria. We are thinking of calling it Gallopton. What do you think? It isn’t decided if it will be called that yet, but so far the response from everypony was good. If it’s not to much trouble, would you please contact my family? I would like to hear from them, and they would probably want to know what has happened to me. Yours faithfully, Moon Dust Not long after Leafy sent my letter, I got a reply letter. It said: Dear Moon Dust I am glad to hear your new home is just about finished. I would like to visit and see your progress. How about lunchtime next Tuesday? Gallopton is a perfectly fine name for the new town. It is good to hear you are getting your subjects opinion as well as your councils. I have sent a letter to your family, your sister is going to come with me when I visit you. You may want to prepare a room for her, as she has agreed to come and be a Princess with you. She doesn’t want you to be alone in your new duty. The next paragraph is written by your sister. --- Hi Dusty! I’m so happy you’re OK. I have been looking for you since your trip to Canterlot that you never came home from. I knew you were OK, just nopony believed me. Can’t wait to see you and your new home. I’m coming to live with you there too! Isn’t that exciting! Mummy wanted to come, but she had to stay and work here. She promises to visit occasionally though. I wish she could come, I’m going to miss her. School has finished for the term, but I’ll have to tell Miss Cherilee that I won’t be coming back. I can’t wait to see you again. From Sun Glow PS. Gallopton is a Terrible name for a capitol city, or a town, or pretty much anything! You might want to consider coming up with a new name for your town. ------ Your sister is very excited to see you. Is there anything you need for your new town? I can send stuff with your sister if you want. Yours Faithfully, Princess Celestia My sisters coming! Yay! Someone I know is coming to live here. I can’t wait until Tuesday. I better send a reply to the Princess. Dear Princess Celestia Tuesday is fine. I can’t wait to see you two. Can you please bring a couple of clocks? It’s annoying not knowing what the time is. Yours faithfully, Moon Dust I went over to Cumulous’ house to tell him to gather up the council so I can tell them the good news. “Hi Cumulous” “Oh, hello Princess. I wasn’t expecting you. Why do you look so happy?” He said “Gather up the rest of the council. I have some news for you all” “Okay” Off he went. A few minutes later everyone was here. “I have some good news for you all. Princess Celestia is coming on Tuesday, and she is bringing my sister Sun Glow to be a princess with me.” “Cool” Said Plum. “But what day is it today?” “Um.....Wednesday?” I said. “Actually it’s Sunday” Said Shadow “That means the princesses are coming in two days! We better get this place cleaned up a bit!” The council hurriedly left the meeting room. I better go organize a room for Sun Glow and Celestia. I can’t have them come and have nowhere for them to sleep. As I left the room, an idea hit me. Why don’t I organize a feast in honour of the two Princesses! On my way to set up their rooms, I stopped in the royal kitchens. A while ago, due to the fact the I can’t cook an edible meal, the council and I decided to hire a group of ponies to do all the cooking. Because there is no form of money in New Equestria yet, we decided that instead of wages, the ponies would have a room up in the castle and they would be given all the uneaten food. In the kitchens, ponies were to cleaning up the mess from building the kitchen. “Hello Princess. What are you doing here?” Said one of the ponies, looking up from her work. “Hello, I was wondering if you and the rest of the ponies working in the kitchen could organize big feast for everypony, Celestia, and my sister, by Tuesday” I said. “Yes. I would be happy to! I’ll send some ponies to gather food for it.” She replied. “Okay then. I’ll leave you to it” I left. This feast would be the first proper feast in New Equestria, and it would be for the pony who raises the sun. It had better be good. I flew over to the storage room next to the royal meeting room. The storage room was where all of unused things were kept. At the moment, we hadn’t had enough time to make any proper beds, due to all of the building, and we probably didn’t have enough resources to make one yet, so we were using hammocks. They were surprisingly comfortable. I levitated a couple of folded hammocks and blankets from the stacks, then exited the room. I trotted over the rope bridges leading to the group of trees supporting my room and a few others. First I went into a room next to mine. I set up a hammock and floated a blanket onto it. This would be Sunny’s room. I then went into the room next to Sun Glow’s. I set up everything. This room would be the one Princess Celestia would stay in during her visit. I flew back over to the storage rooms and found the fluffiest pillows there, then went back to their rooms to put the pillows on the hammocks. I flew back and forth, getting tables, flower vases, rugs and heaps of other stuff for their rooms, until the rooms looked, well, room-like. Satisfied with my work, I flopped down on the hammock in my room and fell asleep. The next day I woke up to find that a thin layer of frost had settled over New Equestria. Unwilling to get up, I snuggled up into my blanket. It wasn’t the warmest blanket, probably because it was woven from grass, but I was grateful for the warmth it provided. Eventually I forced to get up, with the task of finding out if the frost had done any major damage to the town. I knew that it wouldn’t be good for the crops, but what about the houses everypony has been building? That wasn’t the only reason I wanted to visit town. I also wanted to find the best knitter in New Equestria, and order three big fluffy blankets, pillows that weren’t made of moss and 2 warm hats and scarfs. When I got into town I searched everywhere for a place that made woolen stuff. Eventually I found somepony who could make the items I wanted. All she wanted in exchange was wool to make them. Luckily I had an idea for wool. Rose had told me that Ursa grow a very long winter coat near winter, and it was getting very close to winter now. She also told me that the coat needed trimming everyday from the speed it grew. If I could get to the Ursas cave fast enough, then I could get the fur before she threw it away, and then spin it into wool with my magic. I quickly flew over to the cave. Just in time. “Hello Princess” Said Rose “What are you doing here so early in the morning?” “I want the Ursa hair you trim today. If you haven’t thrown it out already” I replied. “Why in Equestria would you want Ursa hair? Oh well, here it is.” I magically took the hair from Rose. She watched me curiously to see what I would do next. I used my magic to spin the fur into wool. The wool was dark blue, and surprisingly silky. I was amazed ponies hadn’t used Ursa wool before. Then I remembered that Ursa a usually very dangerous and live in the Everfree Forest. “Wool!” Rose said excitedly. “I’m amazed nopony has thought of that before. Now I have a use for the Ursa hair cuttings.” “Thanks for letting me use the hair. I better get this back to the knitter pony. See you later” I zoomed off in the direction I came from. When I got back to the house, the pony living there enchanted lots of sticks to act as knitting needles to knit quickly. I told her that she could use whatever wool is left, and that I’d come back later in the day. I left the house. This time I didn’t fly away. I walked around and looked at the progress the town was making and examined the signs that were made to welcome my sister and Celestia. The signs were mostly just pieces of wood with words carved on, but a rare few had coloured dies colouring the wood and making the words stand out. After exploring the town for a couple of hours, I went back to the knitting pony’s house. Surprisingly everything but the pillows were done. The pillows just needed stuffing with feathers. Something easily done. I took the items I had asked for and flew back towards my room. Back in my room I stripped my wings of a few downy feathers and stuffed them into the pillows. I then put the pillows and blankets on, mine, Celestia’s and Sun Glow’s beds. PrincessesFinally it was Tuesday. Princess Celestia and my sister would be coming any moment now. I looked out my window, and to my surprise, the two Alicorns had appeared outside. Celestia looked the same as usual, but my sister now had to small white wings on her back. Her tiny horn had grown a couple of centimeters. Sun Glow’s mane and tail weren’t long and shimmery like mine and Celestia’s manes, instead it was a lot like Princess Luna’s the first time she had visited Ponyville - Just after Nightmare Moon’s return. Her mane was still her usual red, yellow and orange colour though. She was wearing jewelry very similar to my jewelry. I flew out my window, down to the two Princesses. “Dusty!” Sun Glow yelled in excitement, bouncing over to see me. “Sunny!” I replied with equal excitement. After we had finished bouncing and hugging, I turned to Princess Celestia. “It’s nice to see you again Princess” I said. “I thought I told you to call me Celestia!” The princess replied with a laugh. “Sorry” I said. “Anyway, I see New Equestria is coming along quite nicely. It’s good you’ve got some houses built, because winter is coming very quickly.” Celestia said. “You might want to start organizing Winter Wrap up, or are you going to clean up winter with magic?” “How does that work? I thought pegasus made the weather? Why would we need a Winter Wrap Up if there’s no snow to clean up?” I asked. “Because most of the weather here works like the Everfree forest. Most of the clouds are controllable, but over the colder months, rain and snow clouds will float over here and make rain and snow.” The white Alicorn explained. “I’ll talk to Cumulous about it later” “Good. Now we’ve got that sorted, why don’t we go inside? It’s quite cold today.” “That’s a good idea.” We all went into the main room of the tree palace. It was noticeably warmer inside. “Ah this is much better isn’t it?” Said Celestia. I agreed. After a couple of moments silence, I decided I should talk. “So what do you think of the town so far, Sunny?” “I like it! Have you decided on a name yet? If you have, it better not be Gallopton. That name was terrible!” Sun Glow replied “No, I haven’t chosen a name yet. Do you have any ideas?” “Nah” “I brought a couple of clocks for you. Do you want them?” Asked Celestia “Yeah! Thanks for bringing them!” I said. “It’s been so annoying not knowing the time” She pulled the clocks out of her saddlebags and levitated them over to me. I magically took them and floated them onto the table. “Thanks again” I said. “No problem” Said the Princess. A few more moments passed. Sun Glow looked practically asleep on her hooves. The two princesses must be very tired after coming here, I mean this place is on the other side of the planet! It probably would have taken heaps of both ponies magical energy to teleport here. “You two must be really tired. Do you want me to show you your rooms, then take you down to the feast we’ve prepared?” “That would be wonderful” replied Princess Celestia. “Yeah that would be cool” Sun Glow said. Then lets go! I said. After showing the two princess their rooms, we headed down to the main dining room. I had smelt the food cooking earlier, and I was definitely looking forward to eating it. On the dining room tables, food was being served on leaf plates. The food was mostly apple-based food since it was the only plant that was fully grown and harvestable at the moment. Luckily ponies could survive on flowers and hay and sometimes (very rarely because of the bitter taste) grass. The three alicorns sat down in one of the many seats around the table. When they were sitting down, Pumpkin came and asked if she should tell the rest of the ponies in New Equestria that the feast was starting. The three of us who were at the table started dishing food onto hour plates while everypony gradually entered the room. Once a majority of the chairs were filled, the princesses started to eat their food. It was delicious. Once all the food was eaten, Princess Celestia lowered the sun. Everypony watched in awe as the powerful alicorn lit her horn and directed it towards the sun. The sun shone a little brighter from her magic as it was slowly disappeared behind the horizon. Once the sun was gone, Celestia and Sun Glow retired to their rooms for the night. I stayed up a little longer to help clean up the leaf plates, then I flew to my room. I fell asleep as soon as I lay down. I must have been more tired than I realized. A loud thud woke me from my slumber. I got out of my hammock and looked out the window to see what was causing the noise. I couldn’t see much because it was still dark, so I flew out the window to investigate around town to see if I could find the source of the noise. It didn’t take too long to find out what was going on. A hydra was stuck between two trees near the castle. It was swinging its heads around whacking anything surrounding it, in hope that it will become dislodged. It wasn’t being very successful in this pursuit. On the other hand, it was very successful at knocking down trees. This hydra needed to be moved. Some of the trees could knock down rooms in the tree castle, and if it got free it could run towards the town and destroy the houses everypony has worked so hard on. I lit my horn and tried to push the hydra out of the trees. No luck. It was probably a good thing too, If I was busy trying to push it out, then the hydra could run away before I could get it away from town. I was thinking about how I could sort put this problem when Princess Celestia flew down next to me. She must have been woken up by the hydra too. “We need to somehow move it to somewhere far away from town.” I said. “I know.” The Princess replied. “Maybe if we both work together to push it, then levitate the hydra, we can float it to somewhere far away from here” I suggested. “Or, we could just do this.” Celestia walked up to the hydra (it didn’t notice her coming since it was too busy throwing its heads around crazily) and she lit her horn. A pink aura of magic surrounded the monster, and then it disappeared. “What did you do?” I asked “I teleported it to the nearest lake.” The alicorn explained. “Oh” I said “How did you know where the lake is, and how did you even know there was a lake nearby?” I asked. “I looked around a little bit on the way here. Instead of teleporting here, I decided to teleport near here and fly to the place I was meeting you.” She explained. “Ok” “It’s nearly morning. I must go and raise the sun” The princess left. Instead of flying back to my room, I flew to my sisters room. I opened the door and went inside. My sister had just woken up. “Hi Dusty” Said Sun Glow. She yawned. “Did you sleep well?” I asked “Yeah. Did you?” She replied “Yep. I woke up a bit early though. A hydra decided to wake me up by smashing trees.” I said “A hydra! What happened? Is it gone now?” She said, her pupils shrinking in fear “Yes, it’s gone. Don’t you worry.” I replied, then I explained what happened earlier. “Oh good. I’m glad I wasn’t there, Hydra are scary!” My sister said with relief. “Anyway are you looking forward to looking round town today?” I asked “Yeah! I can’t wait to see everything and make some friends!” WeatherA few weeks later Sun Glow was settling in nicely. She had already started to help around the tree castle. It was normal for her to be seen running over the rope bridges and playing all sorts of games with the few kids around New Equestria. Everyday had started running on a schedule. Wake up. Eat. Play with Sunny. Eat. Visit town. Eat. Sleep. Soon the only noticeable difference between the days was the temperature dropping. It dropped by a few degrees every day. I really must talk to Cumulous about the weather. With that goal in mind, I set off in the direction of his cloud house. After a few minutes I arrived at my destination. I walked up to the door and knocked on it. Even after over a month being able to walk on clouds, it still never stopped surprising me that a cloud door made the same sounds as a normal door. I still knocked on it carefully to stop my hoof from going through the cloud. Nopony answered my knocks. To see if anyone was home, I snuck round the house to the window. I peeked through it. There was nopony inside. “Hey! Stop that! Didn’t anypony teach you not to spy on other ponies?” Cumulous’s teasing voice made me jump. “Oh there you are. I was looking for you” I replied, deciding not to answer to his bad joke. “Why were you looking for me? Wait, let me guess. You want me to teach your sister to fly?” “No. Are you offering?” “Might as well. I bet she’ll be a better flier than you.” The blue pegasus said. “Hey! That’s not fair, she’s younger than me, she’ll learn faster than me!” I said “Anyway, onto more serious business. As much as I love your joking around, this is very important” “Aw. So whats this very important business?” “Well, you may have noticed that the days are getting shorter, and colder” I explained “So what?” “Well, a few weeks ago when Celestia was staying, she mentioned that winter was coming, and we needed to decide on whether we wanted to control the weather by magic, or pegasi” Cumulous nodded. “That makes sense. I think I’d prefer it if pegasus controlled the weather. Anyway, the pegasi around here are pretty lazy, it’d do them good to have some sort of job. Which reminds me, you remember The Wonderbolts back in Equestria?” “Yeah, why?” “Well, I was thinking it would be a good idea to have something sort of similar around here” He explained “That is a good idea! It would give the younger pegasus somepony to admire, and it would give the older pegasus something to work towards.” I said “Yup. Can I start it? Please? I could call it the LightningBolts, and Shadow could help make some awesome uniforms. We could perform at all the special events and everything” “Well, it sounds like you already have it all sorted out. I’ll leave you to organize it. But, before you start anything, you need to sort out a weather patrol, and plan a Winter Wrap Up” “On it boss” Said the blue pegasus giving an exaggerated salute. I flew off to tell Sun Glow about the plan. And that she was going to have flying lessons. To tell the truth, I was incredibly excited about the aerial team. Cumulous’ idea was definitely a good one. SistersI woke with a start as I hit the floor. I had somehow rolled off my bed and onto the hard wooden floor. I stood up and headed over to the mirror, then I quickly ran a brush through my flowing mane. It didn’t take to much effort to get my mane untangled (one of the benefits of having a mane like Celestia’s), so within minutes I was heading towards the kitchens. In the dining room, Sun Glow had just finished eating. She quickly stood up and left when I entered the room. She didn’t even stop to say ‘Hello’ to me. I was slightly sad about that. Sun Glow always stopped to talk to me. Why wasn’t she now? I thought back over the past few days to see if I did something she didn’t like. There was nothing unusual, so why was she ignoring me? I abandoned the idea of breakfast and sprinted after the white filly. I had to be a good big sister and find out what was wrong. I was just exiting the room when it hit me. I hadn’t been a good big sister for the past few weeks. Time that could have been spent with Sunny was spent with Cumulous organizing Winter Wrap up or helping ponies that hadn’t finished building houses yet finish building houses. I was a bad sister. I sprinted faster after that and eventually caught up with the young alicorn. “What do you want?” Asked Sun Glow with a hint of anger in her voice. “I want to spend some time with you. I haven’t been recently” I replied. “Are you sure you aren’t too busy? I wouldn’t want you to get in trouble with your boss. Oh thats right, you don’t have a boss. You could easily take a day off without having to ask anypony. In fact, you could easily get somepony else to help build houses or prepare for winter so you’d have more time to spend with me. So why haven’t you” I flinched at the harsh reality of what she was saying. It was all true. I was the worlds worst sister. “No, I’m not too busy. I’ll even stop working for a whole week to spend time with you if that’s what you want.” “Are you sure?” She asked. “Do you really want to spend time with me?” “Of course I do! You’re me sister” I said “Thank you so much. It’s been incredibly boring here, especially with Leafy away. What are we going to do? Can we go down to the river? Wait, even better, could you teach me to fly. I’m sure you’re a lot better than Cumulous, and a better teacher too” My sister said excitedly. All the anger had gone from her voice, and it had been replaced with happiness. My tummy grumbled. “We can do both of those things, and more. But first, I need food” I announced After a delicious meal of hay fries and an apple, I headed to Sun Glow’s room. Sunny was waiting inside, sitting on her bed wearing a wooly hat and a scarf. “You ready to go?” I asked “Definitely!” The white alicorn replied. “Then lets go!” Sunny jumped on my back like she used to for ponyback rides when she was a filly, and I flew out through the window. Five minutes later we were landing by the river. Thanks to the bitter cold, the river was freezing, so we couldn’t swim in it, but that didn’t decrease Sun Glows excitement about visiting the river. I had absolutely no idea why Sunny liked rivers so much. Back in the other Equestria she always wanted to go down to the stream for picnics and all sorts of other things. Me and Mum always joked that her cutie mark would be something to do with rivers, but so she hadn’t got one yet, so I guess her cutie mark will be for something unrelated to rivers. “So, what do you want to do here?” I asked “Anything!” Sun Glow replied “That doesn’t help me come up with ideas!” I said with a laugh. “Well, you could teach me to fly!” The white filly said thoughtfully. “Okay then. What has Cumulous taught you so far?” “Not much. I can hover, but not move around” She explained. “Show me” I said Sun Glow flapped her tiny wings and started levitating a few feet off the ground. “That’s good. Now try leaning slightly to the left” The white alicorn leaned to the left. Soon she was turning around to face the other direction. “Cool!” She said, “But how do I move forward?” “I was getting to that” I replied. “Tilt your wings slightly. Keep flapping” The filly did as I told her. She started to move forwards slightly. Now she was hovering just over the river. “Great. Now lean to the left while still flapping the way I told you” Sunny tried to do as I said, but it must have been a little bit to tricky for her. Her flaps faltered and she descended slightly. “Woah. I’m nearly touching the water. How do you go higher?” Sun Glow asked. “Just flap your wings normally” I answered. The alicorn tilted her wings so they faced the ground. She was just about to continue flapping when a leaf fell from a nearby tree and landed on her back. She flinched and tried to dust it off, causing her to forget to flap. She fell into the freezing cold river. “Aeiiiah! The water is FREEZING!” She exclaimed once her head broke the surface. “What do you expect it’s nearly winter!” I said while heading over to the river bank to help her out. “I better get you home and into some warm clothes before you catch a cold” “Aw, but we were having so much fun!” “No buts. If you catch a cold you won’t be able to enjoy the fun activities I have planned for this week.” I said. “Ooh, what do you have planned!” “It’s a surprise” “Aw” Sunny jumped onto my back. She felt really cold, and now that she was closer I could hear her teeth chattering. I flapped my wings and flew off towards the tree-castle. When we got there, I wrapped Sun Glow up in a warm, woolen ursa wool blanket and gave her a hot chocolate. Hopefully she doesn’t get a cold. It would put an end to most of my plans for the week. No matter how hard I tried, Sun Glow still got a cold. She spent most of the next day in bed, coughing and sniffling. It gave me plenty of time to work, but after the other day I would much rather have spent it with my sister. She better be well by Friday. Nothing could get in the way of my plan. I’d already sent out invites to everypony in New Equestria to invite them to the first ever, New Equestria Sisterhooves Social. I had based it off the old SisterHooves Social in Ponyville. It had mostly the same events and everything. It would be the first official event that will be continued every year. Sun Glow just couldn’t miss it. Sisterhooves socialThe week passed really quickly after Sun Glow had recovered from her cold. We spent hours playing, flying and having fun. Eventually Friday came. We headed out towards the town, where the Sisterhooves Social was being held. I had spent most of yesterday decorating the place and setting up the activities. When my sister and I arrived, the ponies there didn’t bother with formalities. They just continued what they were doing, just as I had told them to. Of course there were a few ponies who did bow, they probably didn’t hear my message. Sun Glow was wearing her woolly clothes, because of the cold, but as well as them she wore a blue bandanna around her leg. I wore matching clothes. The blue bandanna was our team uniform. At the old Sisterhooves social back in Ponyville, everypony who was competing wore something to identify two ponies as siblings, and I wanted to continue doing that here. One of the members of the council, Shadow, started to announce the start of the competition. He had used his magic to amplify his voice. Quite an impressive feat for such a young unicorn. “Fillies and Gentlecolts. I welcome you all to the first annual Sisterhooves Social!” He said. “I hope you are all wearing warm clothes since the weather pegasi have just told me that the weather is supposed to get very cold today. Anyway, the competition is a race to finish the obstacle course. Contenders will have to walk across a thin wooden beam, crawl through a small tunnel, balance an apple on their head for 20 seconds, then eat an apple. There will then be a 50 meter sprint to the finish line. Remember, no magic or flying or you will be instantly disqualified. The race starts in 5 minutes” I was starting to get really nervous now, I really wanted to win this race for my sister, I also wanted this to be a good fair race. I had even left the course designing to my council so I didn’t just pick things I liked. “All contenders must make their way to the start line now please” Shadows voice boomed “Are you ready to go sis?” I asked my little sister. “Yep. Should we head to the start now?” The little alicorn asked “Yes. We don’t want to miss our race” We headed over towards the start line. Just as Cumulous was starting the race. We lined up on a line drawn in the dirt. A few more ponies came after us, so we weren't too late. “In the hooves of the starter........Go!” On 'Go' everypony sprinted forwards to the first obstacle. The balance beam. I lifted Sun Glow up with my teeth and placed her on the plank. She slowly crept towards the end. “You can do it! Don’t worry” I encouraged. Eventually she got to the end. Everypony was ahead of us by the time we had passed the first obstacle, but that didn’t discourage us. We sprinted onto the next activity. The tunnel was a slightly easier task. The tunnel was made of lots of sticks leaned against a huge stick. Sort of like a triangle shaped lean-to. Luckily it was very wide and easy to fit through, even for a larger than average pony like myself. The next activity was the apple balance. Lots of ponies were struggling with this activity. I saw this as our chance to catch up. “Come on Sunny, lets get ahead of them while they’re still stuck on the apple balance!” I said “Good idea. Which one of us will balance the apple?” Only one pony had to do this activity, it would take too long otherwise. “You can, but if you don’t want to, I will” “I can do it” Sun Glow said “OK then. Lets do this” I stopped myself at the last minute from using magic to place the apple on my sisters head. I lifted up with my teeth and placed it just behind her horn. We took a few tries, but eventually we got it. I don’t think Sunny’s wool hat helped for this activity. For the next task, eating an apple, my sister threw an apple into my mouth. I swallowed it without even chewing. After a bit of choking, we were ready for the sprint to the finish. Me and Sunny raced towards the finish line. We couldn’t come first since the first place getters had finished ages ago, but we still sprinted as hard as we could. We crossed the line and collapsed on the ground, gasping for air. Once I’d caught my breath I said to my sister, “We didn't come first, but we did it!” Cutie marks and cupcakes Part 1 This chapter is from Sun Glows point of view. As I woke up the next morning I had one thing on my mind. My sisters birthday was tomorrow (she’d probably forgotten about it) and with all she had done for me in the past week, I wanted do something in return. I was going to throw the best party ever for her. But first I had to plan it, and I had no idea what Moon Dust liked doing at parties. I quickly brushed my mane, then ran across to the dining room. Sitting on the table was a plate of freshly baked cupcakes. My sister often reminded me that cupcakes aren’t good for breakfast, but I still loved to eat them. I could live off cupcakes, they are by far my favourite food. I gobbled down the treats. I was just finishing them when Leafy the dragon came in. “Mffflamphp” I said with my mouth still full of cupcake. “Nice to see you too Sunny” The green dragon replied. “I see you’ve come back from Canterlot. Did you have fun?” I asked “Yes I did, the boring meeting about boring stuff was very fun” She said sarcastically “Oh. In that case, did the meeting go well?” “Yes it did” Leafy headed over to the kitchen to get some of the gemstones stored for her. When she was coming back I had an idea. “Leafy?” “Yes” “It’s Moon Glows birthday tomorrow, do you know what type of party she likes? I want to throw a surprise party” “Nope. I could ask the council to do a bit of spying if you like, maybe they could find out.” “That’d be great. Thanks” “No problem. You know what. Why don’t I teach you a little baking so you can make some food for the party. I know how much you love cupcakes, so there will probably need to be quite a few at the party” The dragon offered “Really. Thank you so much. When can we start?” I said excitedly “Come back here after lunch” “Okay” A few seconds after I said that, Moon Dust walked in. “What are you two discussing so secretively? If you’re planning to bake me a cake, thanks in advance, but it’s probably not that” The grey alicorn said happily. “No. We were just talking about my trip to Canterlot” Leafy said, covering the fact we were actually planning on baking Dusty a cake. Well, a type of cake anyway. “Okay then. I’ll just grab my breakfast and leave you two to talk about the postage stamp conference” A postage stamp conference! Why would anyone even consider going to one of those! Moon Dust left. “So, see you after lunch?” “Definitely.” After lunch I met Leafy in the kitchen. “So, are you ready to start baking?” “Yep” “Okay then. Here’s the recipe” I looked down at the book. It had a label saying Cupcakes, but the rest didn’t seem like a recipe. Instead it was a song. “I think you got the wrong book. This is a song book not a recipe book!” I exclaimed while flicking through the other pages. “It says recipes on the cover” She showed me the front of the book. It had a picture of a pink pony with incredibly poofy hair. The title said ‘Super yummy recipes’ and underneath it said ‘By Pinkie Pie’. “That explains a bit. Pinkie is a good baker, but she can be incredibly eccentric. I’m not surprised the recipes are written in song” I said. “Oh. Well, you’re in luck. I’ve got another book too” This book looked slightly more conventional. Okay, it says here we need, eggs, flour, sugar etc. You come and read it, I can’t be bothered reading it all out.” The green dragon said. After a few minutes searching for ingredients we had everything we needed to bake cupcakes. We followed the instructions and eventually we had a bowl of cupcake mixture ready to be put into the muffin tray and baked. While spooning out the mixture the most unexpected thing happened. A cluster of purple sparkles surrounded my flank. After a few seconds it disappeared leaving a picture of a spoon and a mixing bowl. “My cutie mark!” I practically shouted. I bounced around the kitchen for a few minutes. I was so happy, the thing I had been trying to find for years had finally appeared. Actually, I wasn’t happy I was ecstatic. “Well that was definitely unexpected” Leafy said. “Who would guess your cutie mark would be for baking” “I know. Isn’t it awesome!” I responded “I can’t wait to tell Moon Dust” “But then she might find out about the surprise party” Leafy said “I didn’t think of that. What am I going to do. She’ll probably notice it before tomorrow” I said “Well it is quite cold today. Maybe you could get away with wearing wooly clothes over it for today” The reptile offered. “Okay, that should work for today at least” I spent the rest of the afternoon baking. It was starting to get dark by the time I left the kitchen to have dinner. I had my woolen vest pulled over my flanks hiding my cutie mark. “Hey Sunny!” Moon Dust called “Hiya sis” I said “I haven’t seen you all day, where were you?” The grey alicorn asked “Outside helping Rose trim the Ursa’s fur” I responded. It was partly true, I had spent the morning doing that. I still felt guilty lying to my sister. I planned to leave as soon as possible to avoid questions that I couldn’t answer. “Wow, it must have heaps of fur if it took all day to trim it” “Yeah, it looked like a sheep” I lied. “That must have been funny to see” Moon Dust said with a laugh “Yeah, it was” I replied with hardly any enthusiasm. “From the way you’re speaking I think it wasn’t as funny as it sounded” “Dinner’s ready” Said one of the kitchen staff. He brought two plates of delicious smelling food and placed them on the table. “Thank you” “No problem. Enjoy the food” He left As soon as he was gone I gobbled down the food with manners very inappropriate for a princess. “Slow down. The foods not going to run away you know” Said Moon Dust through giggles. “Yeah, but I’m in a hurry. Got to go now bye” I said hurriedly “Wait! Why are you in a hurry” My sister asked using her magic to stop me leaving the room. “Homework. Gotta go. See ya” I sprinted out the door just to hear my sister say “But you don’t have homework. You don’t go to school” Once out of the dining room and away from my nosy sister I stopped running. My next stop was in town. I was going to get a present for her. Cutie marks and cupcakes Part 2I flew from the deck of the tree house I was on. Since Dusty taught me I had improved heaps. I could now fly short distances at a reasonable speed. About ten minutes later I arrived at the place I wanted to go. The wood carver pony’s house. I flew up to the door and knocked on it. A few minutes later a pony, slightly annoyed pony came and answered the door. “You better have a good reason for waking me up” He said, then he noticed who I was. “Sorry princess, I didn’t notice you there. I don’t mind being woken up, I swear! Please don’t send me to the moon” I had to laugh at the last statement. “Don’t worry. Why would I want to send somepony to the moon? I wouldn’t know how to anyway” I said. “I came to ask you if you have any picture frames” “Oh” Said the brown stallion. “I have plenty of frames. What size are you looking for” “I’m not sure exactly. About this big” I said. I indicated the size with my hooves. “Ok. He ran into a different room and came back a few seconds later with a frame” “This good” He asked “Perfect. How much?” “Free of charge” “What! It must have taken ages to make. Don’t think that just because I’m a princess you shouldn’t charge me” “Okay then. Two bits” I handed over a couple of stone coins. New Equestria had only had a form of money for a couple of weeks, but already a couple of the banks my sister had set up had been robbed. After putting away the money the stallion handed over the picture frame. “Thanks” I said “No problem. Come back again sometime” I left. My next stop was at Cumulous’s house. I wanted to see if the flying team he was organizing would be ready to perform at Moon Dusts party. After finding out that they were, I flew back to my room and fell asleep. Morning light crept in through the glassless windows waking me up. Today was the day. Moon Dusts’ birthday. That also meant I could finally tell her about my Cutie Mark. I couldn’t wait. I got up and had breakfast. Luckily I didn’t see Moon Dust in the dining room. After quickly gobbling my breakfast I headed back to my room to find some party decorations. A couple of weeks ago I asked Princess Celestia for some so there would be decorations at Dusty’s a party. I searched everywhere in my room and eventually found them in the last place I looked (the cupboard). “Aha! Here they are” I announced to myself. I grabbed the box and headed down to the dining room. Hopefully Moon Dust wouldn’t be having breakfast. I pushed the door open and levitated the box through the now open door. Luckily nopony was inside. I dropped the box on the table. Once it was on the table, I used my magic to open and sort through the cardboard box. I pulled out the streamers and hung them up around the room. I then spent a few minutes blowing up balloons. I tied some to the tables, and some I attached to the floor after using a useful spell Moon Dust taught me to make them float. Once most of the decorations were set up I went into the kitchen to get the food I baked yesterday. In the kitchen there was no room for anything. Cupcakes and cakes and all sorts of different baked goods were everywhere in the kitchen. On benches, in the cupboard, some of them were even on the floor. I think I did a bit too much baking yesterday. I levitated some of the plates out of the room and placed them on the table. Soon the tables were covered in food. The room was starting to look pretty good. Now all it needed was presents on the table. I hurried back to my room to find the picture frame I had bought. Inside it was a picture of Moon Dust and I a few weeks before we became princesses. It was one of the few things I had brought to New Equestria. When I found the wooden frame, I wrapped it in some big leaves that I had painted different colours. I grabbed the present and galloped back down to the dining room. I dropped it on the table, then I ran to tell all of Moon Dusts friends that they could come to the party. On the way to tell them that, I bumped into my sister. “Why are you in so much of a hurry Sunny? And don’t say homework, that trick won’t work on me again” The grey alicorn said “Um. I’m um...... Helping Leafy to.............. wash the......... windows?” I lied “You’re a really bad liar Sis. We don’t even have windows here. Come on, what are you actually doing?” “There’s Leafy. Gotta gallop, be back soon” I blurted. I quickly ran past my sister and got back to my previous task. Once everypony had gathered in the dining room, I went to find Moon Dust. I found her in her room. “Hiya sis. Do you want to come down to the dining hall?” “Why?” The alicorn asked “It’s a surprise” I said “OK. If I come will you tell me what you were doing this morning?” “All will be explained” I announced “Lets go then” When we finally arrived at the dining room everypony jumped out of their hiding places. “Surprise!” “WOAH!” Moon Dust exclaimed “I was not expecting that” “Of course not, what’s the fun in a surprise party if you know it’s going to happen?” I said “But why throw a party for yourself? It is your birthday today isn’t it. Or was I wrong?” “WHAT!” I yelled “It is definitely NOT my birthday. That’s not happening for another 6 months” “Then what in Equestria is the party for?” Dusty asked. She looked genuinely confused. “It’s your birthday. Don’t you remember? The 7th of January has always been your birthday” “Oh. In that case, nopony go into the garden for a while” “Why not” I asked “The council were all talking of parties so I thought it was your birthday and set up a party there” “Oh” “Don’t worry about cleaning it up now, you have a party to enjoy” “Okey Dokey then. Oh, and while I remember, why were you hiding so much earlier?” “Right. I got my cutie mark, but you couldn’t see it because it would ruin your surprise party” I quickly explained. “That makes sense. So is your special talent baking?” The grey alicorn asked “Yup” “That explains why there is so much food here” “Yup” “OK then. Now I have that sorted out. Lets party!” The party continued without a hitch. After the party, I decided to write to Mum, I had been quite a long time since I’d sent a letter. Dear Mum Me and Dusty are enjoying life here in New Equestria (We’re still working on the name). As you know it was Dust’s birthday today. She’d completely forgotten about it. She’s never been good at remembering dates. Anyway when I was baking a cake for her, the most unexpected thing happened. I got my cutie mark. So it turns out my special talent is baking. Isn’t that exciting? Hope to here from you soon, Sun Glow The next day I woke up and went down to the dining room for breakfast. Moon Dust was already down there eating leftover cake. “Morning Sunny” She said through a mouthful of cake. “Morning” I replied. “Do you happen to know why Mum sent me a calendar for my birthday? There was a note saying that she was inspired to get it by a note from you.” Yes. I know the joke at the end is bad. Also, I'm really sorry for not updating more, you might have noticed that this story is on hiatus. School has been getting in the way, and I don't have too much time to write. Flight Lessons“Okay are you ready to get started?” Asked the pale blue pegasus “Yes” I replied. “Then let’s start!” The pegasus had all finished making the cloud houses, so Cumulous had offered to give me flying lessons. “We’ll start off with levitating. I don’t expect much progress since from what you’ve told me you only got those wings this morning. But we’ll give it a try” “Okay. What should I do” “Try moving your wings up and down” I stretched out my new wings and slowly moved them up and down. It was hard at first, but it got a bit easier once I was used to my new muscles. “Now try moving them a bit faster” I flapped them a bit faster. Eventually I rose a few centimeters off the ground. “That’s it! Keep going. Flap them a little faster” I franticly flapped my wings. “That won’t work. You won’t get anywhere by randomly flapping. Keep the flaps even” I tried his method, and it worked. Soon I was floating above the tree tops. “How do I land?” I asked “Lean towards the ground” The blue pegasus replied. I complied. Soon I was zooming back down to the ground. “Good work! I wasn’t expecting that much progress in one lesson” “I didn’t either” I looked up at the sky. The flying lesson took a lot longer than expected. The sun was setting, making the sky orange and purple. I better get back to everyone else.
UpgradeI nervously approached the doors to the royal court room. Through the wooden barrier the two Alicorn Princesses held my fate in their hooves. I was really beginning to regret ‘borrowing’ those cupcakes from Sugarcube Corner. “Guards, bring to me the unicorn Moon Dust” a voice commanded from inside the room. Two of the Royal guards opened the huge door and summoned for me to come in. I slowly stepped in through the doors. The royal court room was nothing like I had expected it to be. The floors and walls were marble and in the middle of the room, leading to the front was a long red carpet. The windows were the most spectacular thing about the room though. Each window was a stained glass picture portraying moments from the history of Equestria. I recognized the Elements of Harmony defeating Nightmare Moon and Discord, but the rest of the windows showed events that I didn’t know about. I figured they were from a long time ago. “Moon Dust, you are brought here today be trailed for the stealing of one of Miss Pinkie Pie’s cupcakes. Are you guilty of the accused crime?" Said Princess Celestia, her voice projecting all through the room. “Yes, I am guilty of the Crime” I replied. “That’s good. I couldn’t let someone who wasn’t honest rule New Equestria” Now that was unexpected. “Rule New Equestria? What do you mean by that?” I asked. “You think I brought you here for stealing a cupcake? That would be ridiculous! I have been watching you for some time now, stealing the cupcake was just an excuse to bring you here” The Princess explained. “The real reason you are here is because Equestria is over-crowded” “But what can I do about that? My special talent is architecture, not solving the problems of Equestria!” “You can solve this problem by becoming a princess and leading 180 ponies to a new Equestria on the other side of this planet. There will be 90 mares and 90 stallions, 30 of each type of pony. You can decide on the type of place it will be. It could be an underwater world, a desert, rainforest - Anything! You will also have one creature of your choice defending all of the ponies there because I cannot guarantee it will be entirely safe.” Replied the Princess. “Are you willing to do this?” “Yes, I am Princess” “Then I will start the process of turning you into an Alicorn” I braced myself, preparing for whatever might be coming at me. Suddenly a wave of magic surged through my body, it felt like a million ants burrowing from the tip of my horn and digging through my flesh. I kept my mouth clamped shut, refusing to scream but my attempts were fruitless and I ended up screaming. And then it was over. I stood up, I must have fallen onto the floor during the transformation. When I was standing I noticed that I was now a lot taller. Not quite as tall as Princess Celestia, but close. “Oh good, it worked” Princess Celestia said happily. She floated a mirror up to me so I could see my new look. My face now looked like Celestia’s, but still slightly rounder. My Purple mane was a lot longer than before, it sparkled and billowed about, as if it was blowing in a non-existent wind. In the mirror I noticed two feathery wings folded against my sides. I stretched out my new appendages. They were the same colour as my body, except the grey feathers were shimmering and sparkling, while the fur on my body just stayed the same. “Wow” I said, still staring at my reflection. I looked up at the Princess and noticed that while I had been examining myself, she had been summoning some jewelry very similar to hers. “These are for you. A princess must dress like a princess” She levitated a large gold collar with sapphires embedded in it forwards and fitted it around my neck. Next she lifted a a crown of the same colours onto my head. She than indicated for me to step into the four gold shoes in front of me. The jewelry was quite heavy, but I was sure I would get used to it. Once I was wearing attire appropriate for a princess, she summoned for a small yellow and green baby dragon to come into the room. “This is Leafy. She is going to be your assistant, advisor and friend. She is also your way of communicating with me.” Said the white Alicorn. “Think of the type of scenery you want New Equestria to have when you are being teleported. Any questions before you go” “Yes, just one Princess- “Please call me Celestia, after all you are a princess now too.” “Okay, but you said earlier that there would be a creature to defend New Equestria” “Yes, I did. Tell me now what you would like” “Okay. Can I please have an Ursa?” “Minor or Major?” “Minors grow up into Majors, right? “Yes, they do” “In that case, I will have an Ursa Minor” “As you wish” Celestia said. “Your Ursa and your people will be waiting for you when you arrive. Are you ready to go?” “I am as ready as I’ll ever be” “Okay then. Off you go” A huge pink light flooded the room. It was all I could see for a few moments and then suddenly I was in a forest surrounded by 180 ponies, a baby dragon and a tame Ursa Minor.
Settling InThe ponies surrounding me had no idea what was going on. “What is this place?” “Where am I?” “Help! There’s an Ursa major” “Who is that?” “You’re a princess! Explain to us what’s going on!” “Okay” I replied to nopony in particular. “Listen up everypony!” Suddenly the murmuring stopped. Everypony’s eyes were on me. “Princess Celestia has sent us all here because Equestria is over-populated. We are to start a New Equestria right here. The Ursa Minor is here to defend us from whatever is out here. I am the new appointed Princess Moon Dust.” I said, and surprisingly everypony listened. “Any questions?” “What are we supposed to eat, and where are we going to sleep?” I bit my bottom lip. That was the question I knew would come up. I had no answer to that one. “I don’t know yet. For now we will have a team of ponies making huts for us to sleep in until we can work out something more permanent. Pegasi will obviously sleep on the clouds for now. For food, I want to see all ponies who are bakers, chefs - anything to do with food, and maybe together we’ll think of something. All ponies with blue on them, except for the ponies meeting me here are in charge of making huts. The rest of you, make friends or help the ponies with the huts. I want to see someone who is good with animals too.” I said. “Off you go” A group of blue ponies headed off to build huts, while a group of ponies with items of food and cutlery as cutie marks headed towards me. “Okay you lot. Does anyone here know anything about food in the wild?” A few ponies raised their hooves. “Okay you three will tell these ponies what to look for, then gather up as much edible stuff as possible. Where’s my animal expert?” A pale pink earth pony stuck her hoof in the air as the chef ponies left to search for food. “What’s your name?” “Rose” She said. “You are now officially in charge of anything to do with animals. Are you okay with that?” “Yes” “Okay. Do you have any idea what Ursas and Dragons eat?” “Dragons eat gemstones, but they can go for weeks without food. Make sure the dragon doesn’t hoard anything though, it will grow until it’s bigger than a mountain! Ursas don’t eat that much. Ursa Minors drink milk and eat grass and rocks. Ursa Majors eat grass and rocks. Is that any help?” “Thanks for that. You were a huge help” “Not for me though” Said Leafy the dragon. She was standing next to me the whole time. “I like to eat. Now I won’t get to eat anything for ages, because you said I didn’t have to eat for weeks at a time!” “Don’t worry I will feed you as soon as I find a gemstone that we don’t need” “You better” The dragon said while glaring at me. At that moment one of the chef ponies came back from exploring. “Princess Moon Dust. We have found a small patch of apple trees. Can we have some more ponies to help carry the apples back here?” “Yes, take whoever you want” “Thank you Princess” He galloped off to a group of chatting ponies, then galloped off in the direction he came from. The group of ponies followed. “Well, at least we’ll have food tonight” Rose said happily “Yeah. I better go and check on the huts that are being built. Hopefully we’ll have shelter tonight as well” “See you later then?” “Definitely” I headed off towards the group of ponies building huts. Unicorns were telekinetically snapping branches off trees and levitating them towards the ground where the earth ponies leaned them against trees. Another group of unicorns were weaving the long grass into mats and rope. They placed the mats over the branches and tied them on to the lean-to with ropes. They had already made hundreds of little huts. “Good job everypony!” The ponies looked up from their work “We are trying as hard as we can your majesty” One of the hut builders said. “We should be finished very soon.” “Brilliant! I better go see how the pegasi are doing with the clouds” “Okay. We’ll get back to work now” The ponies got back to work. I trotted over to a place where I could see the pegasus working on cloud houses, then I realized I had wings now, and could probably fly. I gave them a quick flap. Unfortunately I still wasn’t used to them, so I couldn’t move them much. I made a mental note to ask one of the Pegasus to teach me to fly. For now I would have make do with just asking how they were doing. “How are the cloud houses coming along?” I shouted out to the pegasus. “Excellently! Why don’t you come up and see?” “I’m afraid I can’t fly yet. Maybe once you are finished with the houses you could ask a pegasus to teach me!” “We’re just about finished now. I will come and teach you in a couple of minutes” “Okay then. See you later!”
PlansDear Princess Celestia, It’s hard to believe only a week has past since I arrived here in New Equestria. Already we have found sources of food and water, and we have built makeshift huts. So far there has been nothing harmful here. I have learnt to fly, thanks to my new friend Cumulous, and I will soon learn to control the weather. A brilliant animal expert named Rose has got the Ursa used to its new environment. She has even found it a cave to live in. We are about to start planning a more permanent village, but the Earth ponies need some seeds so we can grow food besides apples. Could you please send some? Yours faithfully, Moon Dust “Send it Leafy” Leafy blew sparkly green fire onto the letter. The letter disappeared as soon as the flame hit it. When Leafy appeared here, she had a bag full of parchment, quills and ink so I can keep in touch with Princess Celestia. I hadn’t put it to much use yet. But that would change today. Today we were going to start planning a permanent village, and divide up land for ponies to make houses and farm. Yesterday the pegasi had mapped out the area from birds eye view, so we could have a map to make dividing land easier. “Leafy, can you please summon the council?” “Sure” Leafy headed off to search for the council. A few days ago, I had decided that I didn’t want to plan everything and lead a country alone, so I had recruited a few trustworthy ponies into a council. The council consisted of: Cumulous - He was in charge of the weather and buildings in the sky. Rose - She deals with any wild animals we might come across, and was in charge of the Ursa. Pumpkin - She’s in charge of anything to do with food. Shadow - A strange unicorn who is very adept at magic. She helps with any big spells or magic stuff. Plum - He’s in charge of all the farming and gardening in New Equestria. Soon the whole crew was gathered in the official meeting hut. (It’s a normal lean-to with more room than a normal hut so it fits more ponies in it!) Now that the council was all here, I spread out the map the Pegasi had made. “We need to divide this land up among 180 ponies, then set markers between each of the ponies properties.” “Well, this map shows 2 million square meters of land, how about we give each pony 10,000 square meters of land. Then there is 200,000 square meters left that we can use for a castle and a school and whatever else we need.” Said Cumulous “That’s a brilliant idea” I said “Yeah, but do the pegasi need land?” Said Pumpkin “Well if you have a better idea I’d like to hear it!” Exclaimed Cumulous Pumpkin stayed silent. “Okay then, all in favour of giving everypony 1 acre of land, raise your hooves!” Everypony’s hooves shot up into the air. “Brilliant” I said. “Now does anypony have any idea how we can divide the land?” “We could build fences” Suggested Rose. “Good idea. Cumulous, take a group of ponies to build fences and measure out the land. I’ll go announce the situation to everypony else” I said. “Council dismissed” Everypony left. I headed out too. When I was outside, I headed towards the clearing where everypony usually hung out. “Attention everypony!” Everypony looked at me. “The council and I have discussed creating a more permanent town and we have decided that everypony will get 10,000 square meters of land. Cumulous and a group of ponies are dividing up the properties now” I announced. “Once the section is divided, I will send you all off to choose a property. You are in charge of anything that happens on your property. If you want to live with another pony, choose properties next to each other and just knock down the fence. Any questions?” There were no questions. “I will tell you when you can choose a property” The next day Cumulous came and told me all the properties were fenced off. “Attention everypony!” I yelled. “The land has been fenced off. You can now choose the place you want to live. Off you go” It only took a second for the clearing to be clear of ponies.
LettersA week later, trees had been cleared for everypony’s houses, and some were already half way up. Luckily my idea for a castle didn’t need any trees cleared and my house was nearly complete. My castle was going to be a giant treehouse. A spiral staircase wrapped around the trunk of a huge tree. A huge box room encased the trunk. The tree came up though the house, making a natural centre piece. Rope bridges made a pathway between lots of different trees. All of the trees nearby had been converted into treehouses. My room was in one of the trees furtherest from the centre tree. It had a stunning view of the new town, and it was next to the house that was going to be used as a school. Both my room and the classroom had balconies. “Leafy! Can come here? Bring parchment and a quill.” “Coming” Leafy hurried in through the door. “Take a letter” “Okay” Dear Princess Celestia, Thank you for the seeds you sent. My subjects were delighted. We have started constructing the town. All of the houses are just about finished. Some ponies have even starting planting food. The council and I are trying to think of a name for this new town. It needs to be something fancy, because once we have more towns, this will be the capitol of New Equestria. We are thinking of calling it Gallopton. What do you think? It isn’t decided if it will be called that yet, but so far the response from everypony was good. If it’s not to much trouble, would you please contact my family? I would like to hear from them, and they would probably want to know what has happened to me. Yours faithfully, Moon Dust Not long after Leafy sent my letter, I got a reply letter. It said: Dear Moon Dust I am glad to hear your new home is just about finished. I would like to visit and see your progress. How about lunchtime next Tuesday? Gallopton is a perfectly fine name for the new town. It is good to hear you are getting your subjects opinion as well as your councils. I have sent a letter to your family, your sister is going to come with me when I visit you. You may want to prepare a room for her, as she has agreed to come and be a Princess with you. She doesn’t want you to be alone in your new duty. The next paragraph is written by your sister. --- Hi Dusty! I’m so happy you’re OK. I have been looking for you since your trip to Canterlot that you never came home from. I knew you were OK, just nopony believed me. Can’t wait to see you and your new home. I’m coming to live with you there too! Isn’t that exciting! Mummy wanted to come, but she had to stay and work here. She promises to visit occasionally though. I wish she could come, I’m going to miss her. School has finished for the term, but I’ll have to tell Miss Cherilee that I won’t be coming back. I can’t wait to see you again. From Sun Glow PS. Gallopton is a Terrible name for a capitol city, or a town, or pretty much anything! You might want to consider coming up with a new name for your town. ------ Your sister is very excited to see you. Is there anything you need for your new town? I can send stuff with your sister if you want. Yours Faithfully, Princess Celestia My sisters coming! Yay! Someone I know is coming to live here. I can’t wait until Tuesday. I better send a reply to the Princess. Dear Princess Celestia Tuesday is fine. I can’t wait to see you two. Can you please bring a couple of clocks? It’s annoying not knowing what the time is. Yours faithfully, Moon Dust I went over to Cumulous’ house to tell him to gather up the council so I can tell them the good news. “Hi Cumulous” “Oh, hello Princess. I wasn’t expecting you. Why do you look so happy?” He said “Gather up the rest of the council. I have some news for you all” “Okay” Off he went. A few minutes later everyone was here. “I have some good news for you all. Princess Celestia is coming on Tuesday, and she is bringing my sister Sun Glow to be a princess with me.” “Cool” Said Plum. “But what day is it today?” “Um.....Wednesday?” I said. “Actually it’s Sunday” Said Shadow “That means the princesses are coming in two days! We better get this place cleaned up a bit!” The council hurriedly left the meeting room. I better go organize a room for Sun Glow and Celestia. I can’t have them come and have nowhere for them to sleep. As I left the room, an idea hit me. Why don’t I organize a feast in honour of the two Princesses! On my way to set up their rooms, I stopped in the royal kitchens. A while ago, due to the fact the I can’t cook an edible meal, the council and I decided to hire a group of ponies to do all the cooking. Because there is no form of money in New Equestria yet, we decided that instead of wages, the ponies would have a room up in the castle and they would be given all the uneaten food. In the kitchens, ponies were to cleaning up the mess from building the kitchen. “Hello Princess. What are you doing here?” Said one of the ponies, looking up from her work. “Hello, I was wondering if you and the rest of the ponies working in the kitchen could organize big feast for everypony, Celestia, and my sister, by Tuesday” I said. “Yes. I would be happy to! I’ll send some ponies to gather food for it.” She replied. “Okay then. I’ll leave you to it” I left. This feast would be the first proper feast in New Equestria, and it would be for the pony who raises the sun. It had better be good. I flew over to the storage room next to the royal meeting room. The storage room was where all of unused things were kept. At the moment, we hadn’t had enough time to make any proper beds, due to all of the building, and we probably didn’t have enough resources to make one yet, so we were using hammocks. They were surprisingly comfortable. I levitated a couple of folded hammocks and blankets from the stacks, then exited the room. I trotted over the rope bridges leading to the group of trees supporting my room and a few others. First I went into a room next to mine. I set up a hammock and floated a blanket onto it. This would be Sunny’s room. I then went into the room next to Sun Glow’s. I set up everything. This room would be the one Princess Celestia would stay in during her visit. I flew back over to the storage rooms and found the fluffiest pillows there, then went back to their rooms to put the pillows on the hammocks. I flew back and forth, getting tables, flower vases, rugs and heaps of other stuff for their rooms, until the rooms looked, well, room-like. Satisfied with my work, I flopped down on the hammock in my room and fell asleep. The next day I woke up to find that a thin layer of frost had settled over New Equestria. Unwilling to get up, I snuggled up into my blanket. It wasn’t the warmest blanket, probably because it was woven from grass, but I was grateful for the warmth it provided. Eventually I forced to get up, with the task of finding out if the frost had done any major damage to the town. I knew that it wouldn’t be good for the crops, but what about the houses everypony has been building? That wasn’t the only reason I wanted to visit town. I also wanted to find the best knitter in New Equestria, and order three big fluffy blankets, pillows that weren’t made of moss and 2 warm hats and scarfs. When I got into town I searched everywhere for a place that made woolen stuff. Eventually I found somepony who could make the items I wanted. All she wanted in exchange was wool to make them. Luckily I had an idea for wool. Rose had told me that Ursa grow a very long winter coat near winter, and it was getting very close to winter now. She also told me that the coat needed trimming everyday from the speed it grew. If I could get to the Ursas cave fast enough, then I could get the fur before she threw it away, and then spin it into wool with my magic. I quickly flew over to the cave. Just in time. “Hello Princess” Said Rose “What are you doing here so early in the morning?” “I want the Ursa hair you trim today. If you haven’t thrown it out already” I replied. “Why in Equestria would you want Ursa hair? Oh well, here it is.” I magically took the hair from Rose. She watched me curiously to see what I would do next. I used my magic to spin the fur into wool. The wool was dark blue, and surprisingly silky. I was amazed ponies hadn’t used Ursa wool before. Then I remembered that Ursa a usually very dangerous and live in the Everfree Forest. “Wool!” Rose said excitedly. “I’m amazed nopony has thought of that before. Now I have a use for the Ursa hair cuttings.” “Thanks for letting me use the hair. I better get this back to the knitter pony. See you later” I zoomed off in the direction I came from. When I got back to the house, the pony living there enchanted lots of sticks to act as knitting needles to knit quickly. I told her that she could use whatever wool is left, and that I’d come back later in the day. I left the house. This time I didn’t fly away. I walked around and looked at the progress the town was making and examined the signs that were made to welcome my sister and Celestia. The signs were mostly just pieces of wood with words carved on, but a rare few had coloured dies colouring the wood and making the words stand out. After exploring the town for a couple of hours, I went back to the knitting pony’s house. Surprisingly everything but the pillows were done. The pillows just needed stuffing with feathers. Something easily done. I took the items I had asked for and flew back towards my room. Back in my room I stripped my wings of a few downy feathers and stuffed them into the pillows. I then put the pillows and blankets on, mine, Celestia’s and Sun Glow’s beds.
PrincessesFinally it was Tuesday. Princess Celestia and my sister would be coming any moment now. I looked out my window, and to my surprise, the two Alicorns had appeared outside. Celestia looked the same as usual, but my sister now had to small white wings on her back. Her tiny horn had grown a couple of centimeters. Sun Glow’s mane and tail weren’t long and shimmery like mine and Celestia’s manes, instead it was a lot like Princess Luna’s the first time she had visited Ponyville - Just after Nightmare Moon’s return. Her mane was still her usual red, yellow and orange colour though. She was wearing jewelry very similar to my jewelry. I flew out my window, down to the two Princesses. “Dusty!” Sun Glow yelled in excitement, bouncing over to see me. “Sunny!” I replied with equal excitement. After we had finished bouncing and hugging, I turned to Princess Celestia. “It’s nice to see you again Princess” I said. “I thought I told you to call me Celestia!” The princess replied with a laugh. “Sorry” I said. “Anyway, I see New Equestria is coming along quite nicely. It’s good you’ve got some houses built, because winter is coming very quickly.” Celestia said. “You might want to start organizing Winter Wrap up, or are you going to clean up winter with magic?” “How does that work? I thought pegasus made the weather? Why would we need a Winter Wrap Up if there’s no snow to clean up?” I asked. “Because most of the weather here works like the Everfree forest. Most of the clouds are controllable, but over the colder months, rain and snow clouds will float over here and make rain and snow.” The white Alicorn explained. “I’ll talk to Cumulous about it later” “Good. Now we’ve got that sorted, why don’t we go inside? It’s quite cold today.” “That’s a good idea.” We all went into the main room of the tree palace. It was noticeably warmer inside. “Ah this is much better isn’t it?” Said Celestia. I agreed. After a couple of moments silence, I decided I should talk. “So what do you think of the town so far, Sunny?” “I like it! Have you decided on a name yet? If you have, it better not be Gallopton. That name was terrible!” Sun Glow replied “No, I haven’t chosen a name yet. Do you have any ideas?” “Nah” “I brought a couple of clocks for you. Do you want them?” Asked Celestia “Yeah! Thanks for bringing them!” I said. “It’s been so annoying not knowing the time” She pulled the clocks out of her saddlebags and levitated them over to me. I magically took them and floated them onto the table. “Thanks again” I said. “No problem” Said the Princess. A few more moments passed. Sun Glow looked practically asleep on her hooves. The two princesses must be very tired after coming here, I mean this place is on the other side of the planet! It probably would have taken heaps of both ponies magical energy to teleport here. “You two must be really tired. Do you want me to show you your rooms, then take you down to the feast we’ve prepared?” “That would be wonderful” replied Princess Celestia. “Yeah that would be cool” Sun Glow said. Then lets go! I said. After showing the two princess their rooms, we headed down to the main dining room. I had smelt the food cooking earlier, and I was definitely looking forward to eating it. On the dining room tables, food was being served on leaf plates. The food was mostly apple-based food since it was the only plant that was fully grown and harvestable at the moment. Luckily ponies could survive on flowers and hay and sometimes (very rarely because of the bitter taste) grass. The three alicorns sat down in one of the many seats around the table. When they were sitting down, Pumpkin came and asked if she should tell the rest of the ponies in New Equestria that the feast was starting. The three of us who were at the table started dishing food onto hour plates while everypony gradually entered the room. Once a majority of the chairs were filled, the princesses started to eat their food. It was delicious. Once all the food was eaten, Princess Celestia lowered the sun. Everypony watched in awe as the powerful alicorn lit her horn and directed it towards the sun. The sun shone a little brighter from her magic as it was slowly disappeared behind the horizon. Once the sun was gone, Celestia and Sun Glow retired to their rooms for the night. I stayed up a little longer to help clean up the leaf plates, then I flew to my room. I fell asleep as soon as I lay down. I must have been more tired than I realized. A loud thud woke me from my slumber. I got out of my hammock and looked out the window to see what was causing the noise. I couldn’t see much because it was still dark, so I flew out the window to investigate around town to see if I could find the source of the noise. It didn’t take too long to find out what was going on. A hydra was stuck between two trees near the castle. It was swinging its heads around whacking anything surrounding it, in hope that it will become dislodged. It wasn’t being very successful in this pursuit. On the other hand, it was very successful at knocking down trees. This hydra needed to be moved. Some of the trees could knock down rooms in the tree castle, and if it got free it could run towards the town and destroy the houses everypony has worked so hard on. I lit my horn and tried to push the hydra out of the trees. No luck. It was probably a good thing too, If I was busy trying to push it out, then the hydra could run away before I could get it away from town. I was thinking about how I could sort put this problem when Princess Celestia flew down next to me. She must have been woken up by the hydra too. “We need to somehow move it to somewhere far away from town.” I said. “I know.” The Princess replied. “Maybe if we both work together to push it, then levitate the hydra, we can float it to somewhere far away from here” I suggested. “Or, we could just do this.” Celestia walked up to the hydra (it didn’t notice her coming since it was too busy throwing its heads around crazily) and she lit her horn. A pink aura of magic surrounded the monster, and then it disappeared. “What did you do?” I asked “I teleported it to the nearest lake.” The alicorn explained. “Oh” I said “How did you know where the lake is, and how did you even know there was a lake nearby?” I asked. “I looked around a little bit on the way here. Instead of teleporting here, I decided to teleport near here and fly to the place I was meeting you.” She explained. “Ok” “It’s nearly morning. I must go and raise the sun” The princess left. Instead of flying back to my room, I flew to my sisters room. I opened the door and went inside. My sister had just woken up. “Hi Dusty” Said Sun Glow. She yawned. “Did you sleep well?” I asked “Yeah. Did you?” She replied “Yep. I woke up a bit early though. A hydra decided to wake me up by smashing trees.” I said “A hydra! What happened? Is it gone now?” She said, her pupils shrinking in fear “Yes, it’s gone. Don’t you worry.” I replied, then I explained what happened earlier. “Oh good. I’m glad I wasn’t there, Hydra are scary!” My sister said with relief. “Anyway are you looking forward to looking round town today?” I asked “Yeah! I can’t wait to see everything and make some friends!”
WeatherA few weeks later Sun Glow was settling in nicely. She had already started to help around the tree castle. It was normal for her to be seen running over the rope bridges and playing all sorts of games with the few kids around New Equestria. Everyday had started running on a schedule. Wake up. Eat. Play with Sunny. Eat. Visit town. Eat. Sleep. Soon the only noticeable difference between the days was the temperature dropping. It dropped by a few degrees every day. I really must talk to Cumulous about the weather. With that goal in mind, I set off in the direction of his cloud house. After a few minutes I arrived at my destination. I walked up to the door and knocked on it. Even after over a month being able to walk on clouds, it still never stopped surprising me that a cloud door made the same sounds as a normal door. I still knocked on it carefully to stop my hoof from going through the cloud. Nopony answered my knocks. To see if anyone was home, I snuck round the house to the window. I peeked through it. There was nopony inside. “Hey! Stop that! Didn’t anypony teach you not to spy on other ponies?” Cumulous’s teasing voice made me jump. “Oh there you are. I was looking for you” I replied, deciding not to answer to his bad joke. “Why were you looking for me? Wait, let me guess. You want me to teach your sister to fly?” “No. Are you offering?” “Might as well. I bet she’ll be a better flier than you.” The blue pegasus said. “Hey! That’s not fair, she’s younger than me, she’ll learn faster than me!” I said “Anyway, onto more serious business. As much as I love your joking around, this is very important” “Aw. So whats this very important business?” “Well, you may have noticed that the days are getting shorter, and colder” I explained “So what?” “Well, a few weeks ago when Celestia was staying, she mentioned that winter was coming, and we needed to decide on whether we wanted to control the weather by magic, or pegasi” Cumulous nodded. “That makes sense. I think I’d prefer it if pegasus controlled the weather. Anyway, the pegasi around here are pretty lazy, it’d do them good to have some sort of job. Which reminds me, you remember The Wonderbolts back in Equestria?” “Yeah, why?” “Well, I was thinking it would be a good idea to have something sort of similar around here” He explained “That is a good idea! It would give the younger pegasus somepony to admire, and it would give the older pegasus something to work towards.” I said “Yup. Can I start it? Please? I could call it the LightningBolts, and Shadow could help make some awesome uniforms. We could perform at all the special events and everything” “Well, it sounds like you already have it all sorted out. I’ll leave you to organize it. But, before you start anything, you need to sort out a weather patrol, and plan a Winter Wrap Up” “On it boss” Said the blue pegasus giving an exaggerated salute. I flew off to tell Sun Glow about the plan. And that she was going to have flying lessons. To tell the truth, I was incredibly excited about the aerial team. Cumulous’ idea was definitely a good one.
SistersI woke with a start as I hit the floor. I had somehow rolled off my bed and onto the hard wooden floor. I stood up and headed over to the mirror, then I quickly ran a brush through my flowing mane. It didn’t take to much effort to get my mane untangled (one of the benefits of having a mane like Celestia’s), so within minutes I was heading towards the kitchens. In the dining room, Sun Glow had just finished eating. She quickly stood up and left when I entered the room. She didn’t even stop to say ‘Hello’ to me. I was slightly sad about that. Sun Glow always stopped to talk to me. Why wasn’t she now? I thought back over the past few days to see if I did something she didn’t like. There was nothing unusual, so why was she ignoring me? I abandoned the idea of breakfast and sprinted after the white filly. I had to be a good big sister and find out what was wrong. I was just exiting the room when it hit me. I hadn’t been a good big sister for the past few weeks. Time that could have been spent with Sunny was spent with Cumulous organizing Winter Wrap up or helping ponies that hadn’t finished building houses yet finish building houses. I was a bad sister. I sprinted faster after that and eventually caught up with the young alicorn. “What do you want?” Asked Sun Glow with a hint of anger in her voice. “I want to spend some time with you. I haven’t been recently” I replied. “Are you sure you aren’t too busy? I wouldn’t want you to get in trouble with your boss. Oh thats right, you don’t have a boss. You could easily take a day off without having to ask anypony. In fact, you could easily get somepony else to help build houses or prepare for winter so you’d have more time to spend with me. So why haven’t you” I flinched at the harsh reality of what she was saying. It was all true. I was the worlds worst sister. “No, I’m not too busy. I’ll even stop working for a whole week to spend time with you if that’s what you want.” “Are you sure?” She asked. “Do you really want to spend time with me?” “Of course I do! You’re me sister” I said “Thank you so much. It’s been incredibly boring here, especially with Leafy away. What are we going to do? Can we go down to the river? Wait, even better, could you teach me to fly. I’m sure you’re a lot better than Cumulous, and a better teacher too” My sister said excitedly. All the anger had gone from her voice, and it had been replaced with happiness. My tummy grumbled. “We can do both of those things, and more. But first, I need food” I announced After a delicious meal of hay fries and an apple, I headed to Sun Glow’s room. Sunny was waiting inside, sitting on her bed wearing a wooly hat and a scarf. “You ready to go?” I asked “Definitely!” The white alicorn replied. “Then lets go!” Sunny jumped on my back like she used to for ponyback rides when she was a filly, and I flew out through the window. Five minutes later we were landing by the river. Thanks to the bitter cold, the river was freezing, so we couldn’t swim in it, but that didn’t decrease Sun Glows excitement about visiting the river. I had absolutely no idea why Sunny liked rivers so much. Back in the other Equestria she always wanted to go down to the stream for picnics and all sorts of other things. Me and Mum always joked that her cutie mark would be something to do with rivers, but so she hadn’t got one yet, so I guess her cutie mark will be for something unrelated to rivers. “So, what do you want to do here?” I asked “Anything!” Sun Glow replied “That doesn’t help me come up with ideas!” I said with a laugh. “Well, you could teach me to fly!” The white filly said thoughtfully. “Okay then. What has Cumulous taught you so far?” “Not much. I can hover, but not move around” She explained. “Show me” I said Sun Glow flapped her tiny wings and started levitating a few feet off the ground. “That’s good. Now try leaning slightly to the left” The white alicorn leaned to the left. Soon she was turning around to face the other direction. “Cool!” She said, “But how do I move forward?” “I was getting to that” I replied. “Tilt your wings slightly. Keep flapping” The filly did as I told her. She started to move forwards slightly. Now she was hovering just over the river. “Great. Now lean to the left while still flapping the way I told you” Sunny tried to do as I said, but it must have been a little bit to tricky for her. Her flaps faltered and she descended slightly. “Woah. I’m nearly touching the water. How do you go higher?” Sun Glow asked. “Just flap your wings normally” I answered. The alicorn tilted her wings so they faced the ground. She was just about to continue flapping when a leaf fell from a nearby tree and landed on her back. She flinched and tried to dust it off, causing her to forget to flap. She fell into the freezing cold river. “Aeiiiah! The water is FREEZING!” She exclaimed once her head broke the surface. “What do you expect it’s nearly winter!” I said while heading over to the river bank to help her out. “I better get you home and into some warm clothes before you catch a cold” “Aw, but we were having so much fun!” “No buts. If you catch a cold you won’t be able to enjoy the fun activities I have planned for this week.” I said. “Ooh, what do you have planned!” “It’s a surprise” “Aw” Sunny jumped onto my back. She felt really cold, and now that she was closer I could hear her teeth chattering. I flapped my wings and flew off towards the tree-castle. When we got there, I wrapped Sun Glow up in a warm, woolen ursa wool blanket and gave her a hot chocolate. Hopefully she doesn’t get a cold. It would put an end to most of my plans for the week. No matter how hard I tried, Sun Glow still got a cold. She spent most of the next day in bed, coughing and sniffling. It gave me plenty of time to work, but after the other day I would much rather have spent it with my sister. She better be well by Friday. Nothing could get in the way of my plan. I’d already sent out invites to everypony in New Equestria to invite them to the first ever, New Equestria Sisterhooves Social. I had based it off the old SisterHooves Social in Ponyville. It had mostly the same events and everything. It would be the first official event that will be continued every year. Sun Glow just couldn’t miss it.
Sisterhooves socialThe week passed really quickly after Sun Glow had recovered from her cold. We spent hours playing, flying and having fun. Eventually Friday came. We headed out towards the town, where the Sisterhooves Social was being held. I had spent most of yesterday decorating the place and setting up the activities. When my sister and I arrived, the ponies there didn’t bother with formalities. They just continued what they were doing, just as I had told them to. Of course there were a few ponies who did bow, they probably didn’t hear my message. Sun Glow was wearing her woolly clothes, because of the cold, but as well as them she wore a blue bandanna around her leg. I wore matching clothes. The blue bandanna was our team uniform. At the old Sisterhooves social back in Ponyville, everypony who was competing wore something to identify two ponies as siblings, and I wanted to continue doing that here. One of the members of the council, Shadow, started to announce the start of the competition. He had used his magic to amplify his voice. Quite an impressive feat for such a young unicorn. “Fillies and Gentlecolts. I welcome you all to the first annual Sisterhooves Social!” He said. “I hope you are all wearing warm clothes since the weather pegasi have just told me that the weather is supposed to get very cold today. Anyway, the competition is a race to finish the obstacle course. Contenders will have to walk across a thin wooden beam, crawl through a small tunnel, balance an apple on their head for 20 seconds, then eat an apple. There will then be a 50 meter sprint to the finish line. Remember, no magic or flying or you will be instantly disqualified. The race starts in 5 minutes” I was starting to get really nervous now, I really wanted to win this race for my sister, I also wanted this to be a good fair race. I had even left the course designing to my council so I didn’t just pick things I liked. “All contenders must make their way to the start line now please” Shadows voice boomed “Are you ready to go sis?” I asked my little sister. “Yep. Should we head to the start now?” The little alicorn asked “Yes. We don’t want to miss our race” We headed over towards the start line. Just as Cumulous was starting the race. We lined up on a line drawn in the dirt. A few more ponies came after us, so we weren't too late. “In the hooves of the starter........Go!” On 'Go' everypony sprinted forwards to the first obstacle. The balance beam. I lifted Sun Glow up with my teeth and placed her on the plank. She slowly crept towards the end. “You can do it! Don’t worry” I encouraged. Eventually she got to the end. Everypony was ahead of us by the time we had passed the first obstacle, but that didn’t discourage us. We sprinted onto the next activity. The tunnel was a slightly easier task. The tunnel was made of lots of sticks leaned against a huge stick. Sort of like a triangle shaped lean-to. Luckily it was very wide and easy to fit through, even for a larger than average pony like myself. The next activity was the apple balance. Lots of ponies were struggling with this activity. I saw this as our chance to catch up. “Come on Sunny, lets get ahead of them while they’re still stuck on the apple balance!” I said “Good idea. Which one of us will balance the apple?” Only one pony had to do this activity, it would take too long otherwise. “You can, but if you don’t want to, I will” “I can do it” Sun Glow said “OK then. Lets do this” I stopped myself at the last minute from using magic to place the apple on my sisters head. I lifted up with my teeth and placed it just behind her horn. We took a few tries, but eventually we got it. I don’t think Sunny’s wool hat helped for this activity. For the next task, eating an apple, my sister threw an apple into my mouth. I swallowed it without even chewing. After a bit of choking, we were ready for the sprint to the finish. Me and Sunny raced towards the finish line. We couldn’t come first since the first place getters had finished ages ago, but we still sprinted as hard as we could. We crossed the line and collapsed on the ground, gasping for air. Once I’d caught my breath I said to my sister, “We didn't come first, but we did it!”
Cutie marks and cupcakes Part 1 This chapter is from Sun Glows point of view. As I woke up the next morning I had one thing on my mind. My sisters birthday was tomorrow (she’d probably forgotten about it) and with all she had done for me in the past week, I wanted do something in return. I was going to throw the best party ever for her. But first I had to plan it, and I had no idea what Moon Dust liked doing at parties. I quickly brushed my mane, then ran across to the dining room. Sitting on the table was a plate of freshly baked cupcakes. My sister often reminded me that cupcakes aren’t good for breakfast, but I still loved to eat them. I could live off cupcakes, they are by far my favourite food. I gobbled down the treats. I was just finishing them when Leafy the dragon came in. “Mffflamphp” I said with my mouth still full of cupcake. “Nice to see you too Sunny” The green dragon replied. “I see you’ve come back from Canterlot. Did you have fun?” I asked “Yes I did, the boring meeting about boring stuff was very fun” She said sarcastically “Oh. In that case, did the meeting go well?” “Yes it did” Leafy headed over to the kitchen to get some of the gemstones stored for her. When she was coming back I had an idea. “Leafy?” “Yes” “It’s Moon Glows birthday tomorrow, do you know what type of party she likes? I want to throw a surprise party” “Nope. I could ask the council to do a bit of spying if you like, maybe they could find out.” “That’d be great. Thanks” “No problem. You know what. Why don’t I teach you a little baking so you can make some food for the party. I know how much you love cupcakes, so there will probably need to be quite a few at the party” The dragon offered “Really. Thank you so much. When can we start?” I said excitedly “Come back here after lunch” “Okay” A few seconds after I said that, Moon Dust walked in. “What are you two discussing so secretively? If you’re planning to bake me a cake, thanks in advance, but it’s probably not that” The grey alicorn said happily. “No. We were just talking about my trip to Canterlot” Leafy said, covering the fact we were actually planning on baking Dusty a cake. Well, a type of cake anyway. “Okay then. I’ll just grab my breakfast and leave you two to talk about the postage stamp conference” A postage stamp conference! Why would anyone even consider going to one of those! Moon Dust left. “So, see you after lunch?” “Definitely.” After lunch I met Leafy in the kitchen. “So, are you ready to start baking?” “Yep” “Okay then. Here’s the recipe” I looked down at the book. It had a label saying Cupcakes, but the rest didn’t seem like a recipe. Instead it was a song. “I think you got the wrong book. This is a song book not a recipe book!” I exclaimed while flicking through the other pages. “It says recipes on the cover” She showed me the front of the book. It had a picture of a pink pony with incredibly poofy hair. The title said ‘Super yummy recipes’ and underneath it said ‘By Pinkie Pie’. “That explains a bit. Pinkie is a good baker, but she can be incredibly eccentric. I’m not surprised the recipes are written in song” I said. “Oh. Well, you’re in luck. I’ve got another book too” This book looked slightly more conventional. Okay, it says here we need, eggs, flour, sugar etc. You come and read it, I can’t be bothered reading it all out.” The green dragon said. After a few minutes searching for ingredients we had everything we needed to bake cupcakes. We followed the instructions and eventually we had a bowl of cupcake mixture ready to be put into the muffin tray and baked. While spooning out the mixture the most unexpected thing happened. A cluster of purple sparkles surrounded my flank. After a few seconds it disappeared leaving a picture of a spoon and a mixing bowl. “My cutie mark!” I practically shouted. I bounced around the kitchen for a few minutes. I was so happy, the thing I had been trying to find for years had finally appeared. Actually, I wasn’t happy I was ecstatic. “Well that was definitely unexpected” Leafy said. “Who would guess your cutie mark would be for baking” “I know. Isn’t it awesome!” I responded “I can’t wait to tell Moon Dust” “But then she might find out about the surprise party” Leafy said “I didn’t think of that. What am I going to do. She’ll probably notice it before tomorrow” I said “Well it is quite cold today. Maybe you could get away with wearing wooly clothes over it for today” The reptile offered. “Okay, that should work for today at least” I spent the rest of the afternoon baking. It was starting to get dark by the time I left the kitchen to have dinner. I had my woolen vest pulled over my flanks hiding my cutie mark. “Hey Sunny!” Moon Dust called “Hiya sis” I said “I haven’t seen you all day, where were you?” The grey alicorn asked “Outside helping Rose trim the Ursa’s fur” I responded. It was partly true, I had spent the morning doing that. I still felt guilty lying to my sister. I planned to leave as soon as possible to avoid questions that I couldn’t answer. “Wow, it must have heaps of fur if it took all day to trim it” “Yeah, it looked like a sheep” I lied. “That must have been funny to see” Moon Dust said with a laugh “Yeah, it was” I replied with hardly any enthusiasm. “From the way you’re speaking I think it wasn’t as funny as it sounded” “Dinner’s ready” Said one of the kitchen staff. He brought two plates of delicious smelling food and placed them on the table. “Thank you” “No problem. Enjoy the food” He left As soon as he was gone I gobbled down the food with manners very inappropriate for a princess. “Slow down. The foods not going to run away you know” Said Moon Dust through giggles. “Yeah, but I’m in a hurry. Got to go now bye” I said hurriedly “Wait! Why are you in a hurry” My sister asked using her magic to stop me leaving the room. “Homework. Gotta go. See ya” I sprinted out the door just to hear my sister say “But you don’t have homework. You don’t go to school” Once out of the dining room and away from my nosy sister I stopped running. My next stop was in town. I was going to get a present for her.
Cutie marks and cupcakes Part 2I flew from the deck of the tree house I was on. Since Dusty taught me I had improved heaps. I could now fly short distances at a reasonable speed. About ten minutes later I arrived at the place I wanted to go. The wood carver pony’s house. I flew up to the door and knocked on it. A few minutes later a pony, slightly annoyed pony came and answered the door. “You better have a good reason for waking me up” He said, then he noticed who I was. “Sorry princess, I didn’t notice you there. I don’t mind being woken up, I swear! Please don’t send me to the moon” I had to laugh at the last statement. “Don’t worry. Why would I want to send somepony to the moon? I wouldn’t know how to anyway” I said. “I came to ask you if you have any picture frames” “Oh” Said the brown stallion. “I have plenty of frames. What size are you looking for” “I’m not sure exactly. About this big” I said. I indicated the size with my hooves. “Ok. He ran into a different room and came back a few seconds later with a frame” “This good” He asked “Perfect. How much?” “Free of charge” “What! It must have taken ages to make. Don’t think that just because I’m a princess you shouldn’t charge me” “Okay then. Two bits” I handed over a couple of stone coins. New Equestria had only had a form of money for a couple of weeks, but already a couple of the banks my sister had set up had been robbed. After putting away the money the stallion handed over the picture frame. “Thanks” I said “No problem. Come back again sometime” I left. My next stop was at Cumulous’s house. I wanted to see if the flying team he was organizing would be ready to perform at Moon Dusts party. After finding out that they were, I flew back to my room and fell asleep. Morning light crept in through the glassless windows waking me up. Today was the day. Moon Dusts’ birthday. That also meant I could finally tell her about my Cutie Mark. I couldn’t wait. I got up and had breakfast. Luckily I didn’t see Moon Dust in the dining room. After quickly gobbling my breakfast I headed back to my room to find some party decorations. A couple of weeks ago I asked Princess Celestia for some so there would be decorations at Dusty’s a party. I searched everywhere in my room and eventually found them in the last place I looked (the cupboard). “Aha! Here they are” I announced to myself. I grabbed the box and headed down to the dining room. Hopefully Moon Dust wouldn’t be having breakfast. I pushed the door open and levitated the box through the now open door. Luckily nopony was inside. I dropped the box on the table. Once it was on the table, I used my magic to open and sort through the cardboard box. I pulled out the streamers and hung them up around the room. I then spent a few minutes blowing up balloons. I tied some to the tables, and some I attached to the floor after using a useful spell Moon Dust taught me to make them float. Once most of the decorations were set up I went into the kitchen to get the food I baked yesterday. In the kitchen there was no room for anything. Cupcakes and cakes and all sorts of different baked goods were everywhere in the kitchen. On benches, in the cupboard, some of them were even on the floor. I think I did a bit too much baking yesterday. I levitated some of the plates out of the room and placed them on the table. Soon the tables were covered in food. The room was starting to look pretty good. Now all it needed was presents on the table. I hurried back to my room to find the picture frame I had bought. Inside it was a picture of Moon Dust and I a few weeks before we became princesses. It was one of the few things I had brought to New Equestria. When I found the wooden frame, I wrapped it in some big leaves that I had painted different colours. I grabbed the present and galloped back down to the dining room. I dropped it on the table, then I ran to tell all of Moon Dusts friends that they could come to the party. On the way to tell them that, I bumped into my sister. “Why are you in so much of a hurry Sunny? And don’t say homework, that trick won’t work on me again” The grey alicorn said “Um. I’m um...... Helping Leafy to.............. wash the......... windows?” I lied “You’re a really bad liar Sis. We don’t even have windows here. Come on, what are you actually doing?” “There’s Leafy. Gotta gallop, be back soon” I blurted. I quickly ran past my sister and got back to my previous task. Once everypony had gathered in the dining room, I went to find Moon Dust. I found her in her room. “Hiya sis. Do you want to come down to the dining hall?” “Why?” The alicorn asked “It’s a surprise” I said “OK. If I come will you tell me what you were doing this morning?” “All will be explained” I announced “Lets go then” When we finally arrived at the dining room everypony jumped out of their hiding places. “Surprise!” “WOAH!” Moon Dust exclaimed “I was not expecting that” “Of course not, what’s the fun in a surprise party if you know it’s going to happen?” I said “But why throw a party for yourself? It is your birthday today isn’t it. Or was I wrong?” “WHAT!” I yelled “It is definitely NOT my birthday. That’s not happening for another 6 months” “Then what in Equestria is the party for?” Dusty asked. She looked genuinely confused. “It’s your birthday. Don’t you remember? The 7th of January has always been your birthday” “Oh. In that case, nopony go into the garden for a while” “Why not” I asked “The council were all talking of parties so I thought it was your birthday and set up a party there” “Oh” “Don’t worry about cleaning it up now, you have a party to enjoy” “Okey Dokey then. Oh, and while I remember, why were you hiding so much earlier?” “Right. I got my cutie mark, but you couldn’t see it because it would ruin your surprise party” I quickly explained. “That makes sense. So is your special talent baking?” The grey alicorn asked “Yup” “That explains why there is so much food here” “Yup” “OK then. Now I have that sorted out. Lets party!” The party continued without a hitch. After the party, I decided to write to Mum, I had been quite a long time since I’d sent a letter. Dear Mum Me and Dusty are enjoying life here in New Equestria (We’re still working on the name). As you know it was Dust’s birthday today. She’d completely forgotten about it. She’s never been good at remembering dates. Anyway when I was baking a cake for her, the most unexpected thing happened. I got my cutie mark. So it turns out my special talent is baking. Isn’t that exciting? Hope to here from you soon, Sun Glow The next day I woke up and went down to the dining room for breakfast. Moon Dust was already down there eating leftover cake. “Morning Sunny” She said through a mouthful of cake. “Morning” I replied. “Do you happen to know why Mum sent me a calendar for my birthday? There was a note saying that she was inspired to get it by a note from you.” Yes. I know the joke at the end is bad. Also, I'm really sorry for not updating more, you might have noticed that this story is on hiatus. School has been getting in the way, and I don't have too much time to write.
Flight Lessons“Okay are you ready to get started?” Asked the pale blue pegasus “Yes” I replied. “Then let’s start!” The pegasus had all finished making the cloud houses, so Cumulous had offered to give me flying lessons. “We’ll start off with levitating. I don’t expect much progress since from what you’ve told me you only got those wings this morning. But we’ll give it a try” “Okay. What should I do” “Try moving your wings up and down” I stretched out my new wings and slowly moved them up and down. It was hard at first, but it got a bit easier once I was used to my new muscles. “Now try moving them a bit faster” I flapped them a bit faster. Eventually I rose a few centimeters off the ground. “That’s it! Keep going. Flap them a little faster” I franticly flapped my wings. “That won’t work. You won’t get anywhere by randomly flapping. Keep the flaps even” I tried his method, and it worked. Soon I was floating above the tree tops. “How do I land?” I asked “Lean towards the ground” The blue pegasus replied. I complied. Soon I was zooming back down to the ground. “Good work! I wasn’t expecting that much progress in one lesson” “I didn’t either” I looked up at the sky. The flying lesson took a lot longer than expected. The sun was setting, making the sky orange and purple. I better get back to everyone else.
