“Good morning Princess Twilight,” A maid pony said, opening the window. “Looks like a sunny day.” She walked over to the bed, where there was no response and prodded the pony beneath the sheets. “It isn’t proper for a princess to sleep in, Twilight.” There was still no response. She lifted the sheets. “Oh my. Somepony, quick! Get a doctor!”
Just twenty-four hours earlier, Twilight Sparkle had woken up to that very same maid opening that same window, making a comment about the weather. “Good morning Princess Twilight,” the pony said. “It looks a little cloudy today, but it probably won’t rain.” Twilight yawned and stretched her wings.
“What business do I have today?” Twilight asked, walking over to a mirror and brushing her hair with her comb as her maid helped her into her shoes.
“Today we need to welcome in the new rulers of the Crystal Empire, Prince Aegisbright and Princess Serenity.” The maid said. Twilight glanced over to her brother’s badge hanging on the wall and remained silent for a while.
“So they finally found a new Royal Couple,” she said. “I hope Cadence is taking it okay.”
“I don’t believe she’s been told yet, your highness,” the maid responded. “She’s in one of her… moods today.”
“This isn’t right. I have to tell her.” Twilight said. She spread her wings and flew out the window. Her maid watched, stunned.
Twilight Sparkle glided through the air with ease, as she had done in the last hundred years since receiving her wings. She thought back to the first time she used them, feeling giddy and uncertain, wobbling through the air with her friend Rainbow Dash by her side. The thought of her friend brought a twinge of sorrow to Twilight’s happy memory and she decided to focus on the ground.
“Canterlot sure has changed,” she said to herself as she flew past the outer boundary of the sparkling inner city. She coasted over Canterlot Mining Corporation, full of working class earth ponies extracting valuable gems from the caves beneath Canterlot. Gems that had mostly dried up a decade ago, though rumors of a deeper stash underground drove the CMC to dig deeper. She flew over Sweet Apple Acres and decided to stop for a while to visit.
“The Princess is here!” Appleseed shouted, “Look, Granny Appleboom! She’s landing in the orchard!” The Apple Family came out of their home to welcome Princess Twilight Sparkle.
“Howdy there, Princess,” Zapapple said. “What brings you to our humble farm?”
“Just visiting the home of an old friend,” Twilight said, smiling softly with a distant look. “So the apple family goes on, doing what they’ve always done,” she thought to herself and walked over to the Apple Family graveyard.
“Applejack isn’t buried there, remember? She wanted to be laid to rest in the orchard.” Zapapple said, gesturing. “Unless you were visiting Big Macintosh, or Granny Smith?”
The mention of the ponies that she had known brought more twinges of pain to Twilight’s heart. “Yes, I’m sorry. I was looking for Applejack’s grave. Thank you.” She walked over to the orchard and approached the hill where the biggest apple tree once grew. Now just a stump, carved with the inscription “Here lies Applejack. She lived a long, happy life. We hope she finds happiness in the next.” A necklace bearing an orange apple rested on the stump, now rusted over from years of exposure to the elements.
Twilight’s horn lit up as she transformed the dirt around the tomb to bloom with flowers and fine, green grass. She touched the necklace with her hoof and sighed. “I miss you all everyday,” she whispered, then flew off, back on her course towards Ponyville.
She finally made it to the Ponyville Hospital. “Princess Twilight,” a nurse greeted her. “Are you here to visit Cadence? Today’s not one of her better days…”
Twilight brushed past the nurse and headed into the mental trauma ward, towards the refurbished room that had grown to become Cadence’s home for the last twenty years. She opened the door.
“I told that nurse to leave me alone. Oh, Twilight, it’s you. Sunshine, sunshine, ladybugs awake…” Cadence said from the bed before coughing softly. The streak of white on her mane was more prominent now. She had never been the same since Shining Armor’s death.
“They’ve replaced you.” Twilight said. She walked over to the window and opened it, letting a cool current flow through the room. “The Crystal Empire has chosen Prince Aegisbright and Princess Serenity as their new rulers.”
Cadence wore a brief look of anger, then sighed. “I supposed they would. I guess the only surprising thing is that they took so long to do it. How long has it been, Twilight?”
“Twenty years,” Twilight said, looking around the room. A portrait of Prince Shining Armor hung on the far wall, next to an empty vase. It probably once contained flowers, but twenty years is a long time to keep changing the flowers every week. The wallpaper was old and faded, as they couldn’t change it with a patient in the room.
“Look Cadence… It’s been a while. Do you think you’re better now? If you get out there and show them that you’re all okay, maybe they’ll take you back.” Twilight said. “I can’t stand to see you like this.”
Cadence glared. “I will never get over it. I just… need more time okay? Maybe ten more years. I just can’t believe that he’s gone.”
“You’ve had twenty years to believe it. He was my brother. I miss him, but you don’t see me in a hospital bed.” Twilight said.
“You don’t understand…” Cadence said. “He was everything to me. And now he’s gone, and I will never be. I know what’s been going on out there, even in my hospital bed. I have visitors, and they tell me things, all sorts of things. It’s only a matter of time for you, Twilight.”
“What do you mean?” Twilight said. “Maybe you need to get some rest.”
“Oh I know about the rumors about the caves beneath Canterlot where an amazing stash of gems could be found. Isn’t it curious how some of the miners down there were never seen again? A scorched helmet was all that they found.” Cadence smiled at Twilight’s uneasiness.
“I’m sorry, I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Twilight said.
“I was your babysitter, remember? I can tell when you’re lying. So that’s where you’re keeping Spike. How big is he now? How much has his greed consumed him, living down there with all those gems? What will happen when they finally tunnel into his cave and he eats everypony?” Cadence asked. “But of course you can’t tell them that you’re harboring a dragon. They wouldn’t understand. Not even if this dragon was the most precious thing in the world to you, the only thing that you had left. What will happen then, if they take the dragon away from you?”
Twilight had a distant look in her eyes. “I’m going to go welcome the new Prince and Princess of the Crystal Empire. Get better soon.” She turned and left, flying back to Canterlot.
There was one being left for her to talk to. Perhaps he could relate. Twilight Sparkle flew into the Canterlot Royal Garden, where Discord was tending the topiary. “Discord, we need to talk.”
“Is this about my topiary?” He asked, gesturing to rows upon rows of disfigured hedges. “I’m sorry, but it isn’t really my strongest suit. Does make a lovely hobby though.”
“How do you cope with it? You’re always here, and everything around you grows old and dies, leaving you behind.” Twilight Sparkle asked.
“Oh it’s simple really. The first time that happened was with you lot. My first friends, and their friendship was oh so wonderful. Short-lived, but wonderful. I probably would have gone insane when they left. You know, if I wasn’t already.” Discord said, snipping the head of a rose off of a rosebush. It sprouted wings and flew away.
“I see. So after a while, you just stop feeling,” Twilight Sparkle said.
Discord’s eyes narrowed. “Don’t you even think for a second that I don’t miss them. Not a day goes by that I wonder how much better my life would have been if I had made them immortal, like me.”
“What? You could have done that? But why didn’t you?” Twilight asked angrily. “They could still be here right now! We could still be having adventures!”
“Oh believe me, I tried. But they all refused,” Discord said. “Immortality being refused, now that’s a thought. They acted like it was some sort of curse or something. Perhaps it is, and beings like us are just too blind to see it.”
“Thank you. Goodbye, Discord.” Twilight Sparkle flew back to the castle.
“Goodbye, Twilight,” Discord said grimly. “And there goes another one. Maybe I’ll give the dragon a visit.” He sighed as he finished his topiary, taking a step back. This one was a good deal less disfigured than the rest. It was a group of six ponies: two pegasi, a unicorn, two earth ponies, and an alicorn. After giving the sculpture some thought, he walked over and clipped the wings off the alicorn. “She’d like it better this way,” he said.
Twilight Sparkle opened her closet, taking out a cardboard box of her most precious belongings. She sorted through an eggshell fragment with a single scale in it, a stack of letters, a plain yellow dress, and a faded, autographed poster of the Wonderbolt Rainbow Dash, before finding the notebook of Starswirl the Bearded. She brought it out, talking to it softly.
“You were the greatest wizard that ever lived,” she said. “You created the spell that could grant wings and immortality, but never finished it. Was it really because of a lack of friendship? Or was it something else?” She flipped to the last page, where a photograph of her and her five best friends fell out. She grabbed the photograph and hugged it.
“The last time I would be seen without wings,” she whispered. She collapsed onto her bed, pressing it close against her chest. “Why did I have to be the only Alicorn Princess cursed with the knowledge of friendship?” From her bed, she levitated a nearby quill and scroll.
“Congratulations Prince Aegisbright and Princess Serenity. Unfortunately, I will be unable to attend your coronation. I send you the best regards, Princess Twilight Sparkle,” still lying down, she slipped the note underneath her doorway. “That will keep them out of my hair for a while.”
She turned to the side, where she faced the badge her brother wore at his wedding. “Everypony’s gone,” she whispered. “Everypony’s gone, and I’m still here.” She felt tired, so tired that she could sleep forever. She held the photograph even closer to her chest, filled with a longing to return to what once was. And as she fell asleep, her body changed. Her wings shrank back, disappearing. Her mane became disheveled and faded with streaks of gray and her coat became a shade lighter.
Twilight Sparkle was scared. She suddenly felt so old, so weak, so tired. But it was also comforting, like somepony had opened a window and all of the cold, stale air was pushed out by a warm summer breeze. As she drifted off to sleep, her thoughts came back to those of her friends, but this time, they brought no feelings of guilt, no feelings of sorrow or pain. For the first time in many, many years, Twilight Sparkle was finally at peace.
Discord watched from the window, admiring his work. “They’re going to get me for this, I bet. They’re going to find out it was me, and they’re going to seal me back into stone. But in the end, I’m glad that you could be together again,” he said.