Solar Embrace

Chapter One

The Signs

The world as ponies knew it was not a very old place, in the terms of geologic time. In fact, even in the eyes of one such as Princess Celestia, the climate had barely changed at all and the overall landscape had stayed the same. It had been many thousands of years since the glaciers had retreated and the tribal ponies that roamed the landscapes had settled down, creating the very first villages. From these sprang towns, and cities, and then kingdoms: from there, nations and empires, all under the same watchful eye of Celestia's kind, until at last ponies had achieved the harmony needed with the fall of Discord to truly be ready for an alicorn's rule.

Celestia still remembered the day she and her sister had been assigned by their parents, members of the High Alicorn Council, to descend from the stars and become the rulers of Equestria. Mythology had it that ponies split into four different forms based on their origins: earth came from the ground, unicorns were born of magic, pegasi came out of the clouds, and alicorns were the stuff of stars. They had been barely out of their teens all those millennia ago, respective to their species, of course, and each had been given a heavenly body to control. Celestia the sun, her own personal star, and Luna the moon, her personal refuge from the business of the day: they had not expected such responsibility, but took it in stride. In order for them to wield them, and rule fairly, they had to assume the form all alicorns had upon arrival: what appeared to be a large winged unicorn.

There had been peace for around ten years before Discord returned, his "fall" from power a mere setback in his eyes. Even though a large portion of the unicorn population had cast the spell to banish him, he had simply come back stronger than ever. However, he had not expected celestial figures, ponies whose power dwarfed his own should they shed their earthly forms, to be there waiting for him. The battles had been fierce, the earth was tossed around as the great powers collided, and in the end, Discord was once more defeated, though as it seemed, on a more permanent basis.

Equestria was free once more, and so the sisters fell into a routine of ruling the land as little as possible while still keeping everything in order, lest they get a visit from their parents to correct things that had gotten out of control. It was during this time that Celestia, the elder of the two sisters, left the land of Equestria to visit her parents once more for some undisclosed reason, leaving Luna in charge for a relatively short amount of time. Luna grew to love being in charge of both, but the instant Celestia came back from her journey, she began to resent how the ponies celebrated Celestia's time, and instead slept through Luna's own. Her bitterness and resentment grew until it could no longer be contained, and thus her transformation into the fearsome Nightmare Moon was complete.

"And thus is the end of the first book of the world's history," Twilight Sparkle said to Spike and the rest of her friends, all gathered for a small history lesson at the bequest of both princesses. "Next week is the one all about Celestia's time as our sole ruler, with the newest chapter of Luna's return having been added only a few months ago."

"Yes Twilight, we know all about that: we helped with that, remember?" Rainbow Dash said with a smirk. "You know, Nightmare Moon and all that jazz?"

"I remember clearly, Rainbow Dash," the purple mare replied, closing the book and setting it back on the shelf with her magic. "It's just the rest of Equestria doesn't know as much, and it is up to us librarians to educate them on such matters."

"No offense, my dear, but just how many ponies do you think are going to be interested in reading a history book? They are not the most engaging sources of entertainment," Rarity said, puffing up her mane with her hands when she said this.

"I don't know Rarity, but it must be more than you're thinking of," Twilight said, smoothing out the wrinkles in her skirt as she rose to her hooves from her comfy chair. "I'll be right back: Celestia will surely want to know of our progress."

The others rolled their eyes as the purple mare walked off to find a quill, some ink and a piece of parchment. She had been sending letters to the princess much more frequently as of late, and why not? It wasn't every year that the princess had an unusual amount of free time on her hands.

"It does make you wonder though, where we all came from," Spike said, his hand on his chin as if in thought. "I mean, you all are ponies, and all that stuff about earth, clouds, the stars and magic is pretty cool."

"I'm hearin' a "but" in there somewhere," Applejack said with a small grin.

"But where did dragons come from?" Spike asked, laying back on the floor and looking up at the ceiling. "I mean, I've never really thought about it until these last few days, what with these history lessons, and it's strange to me. To be a member of one of the longest-lived species in existence, and yet... I don't know anything more about dragons than when I was younger."

"Spike, even for a dragon, you're still pretty young," Fluttershy said as she readjusted her mane. She liked the fact she had grown it a bit longer than usual, as it hid her face better when she was being shy. "I'm sure you'll find out someday."

"Yeah: even after your last growth spurt, which I think puts you at the same biological age as us, you still have a long way to go," Rainbow Dash agreed. So she had been reading in some of her spare time: not as book smart as twilight, but she knew some bigger words than she used to.

"Yeah, which means one thing: you're gonna have a whole lot of birthday parties to plan out!" Pinkie Pie said, her smile glaringly obvious as she rolled over by Spike.

Spike snorted. "Tell me about it: last I heard, dragons live thousands of years, if not longer. I just have no idea if I'm any different from those other winged dragons." Oh, how he wished he had wings, but so far, no dice: maybe in a hundred years he would finally grow a pair.

"I just hope I'm there to see you get your wings, Spike," Rainbow Dash said, flittering up to hover over the group. "I mean, somepony's gotta teach you to fly, and who better than me? The best flyer in all of Equestria!"

"Rainbow Dash, dear, remember to use your non-boasting voice," Rarity said with a small smile. "I am sure you are an absolutely amazing flyer, and you've proven that many times, but in all of Equestria? Don't you think that might be a bit... excessive? Even for you?"

"Excessive? For me? Nah, I know I'm good enough to be the best," the blue pegasus said with a slight chuckle, casually flying around the room as if there was no gravity at all.

"Still, as much as you may not think it to be important, you do bring up an important point, Rainbow Dash," Twilight said as she came back, her magic scribbling over a piece of parchment paper. "The muscular and skeletal structures of ponies and dragons, though separated by millions of years of evolution, have the same relative types. Sure, dragons have their internal magic at a much higher level than most species, but other than that and their fire system, we are basically the same: anatomically speaking."

"Twilight, you know we're good friends and all, but sometimes you can be such an egghead," the blue pegasus said with a smile.

"I'm gonna hafta agree with Dash on this one: I didn't understand half the words you just said," Applejack said, scratching the back of her head right below her mane.

The purple unicorn sighed: sometimes she wished her friends had gotten a more decent education, but there wasn't exactly a university in Ponyville, after all. Plus, it cost bits to enroll, and none of her friends had near the funds to do so, even though they all more or less had jobs or businesses to run. "Tell you what, Applejack: in exchange for attending these history lessons, I'll also throw in some lessons on grammatical correctness and understanding."

"Um... thanks?" Applejack said, not exactly looking forward to such an endeavor. "I'll be sure to go to one when I don't have no work to do out in the orchards."

"Please, Applejack: I can perfectly schedule sessions where nothing conflicts," Twilight said, her scribbling finishing. She rolled the parchment tightly and handed it to Spike. "Besides, if we do miss a session, what's the worst that could happen?"

Meanwhile...

It was indeed a fine, sunny day: of course it would be, what with Celestia making sure to be very precise in the movement of the sun. Each day, every day: precise, meticulous movements that were indiscernible to those who were not an alicorn or similarly long-lived creature.

"Indeed, it is a fine day," Celestia said softly to herself, looking up at the sky from her balcony. For once, she did not have a gaggle of emissaries swarming her to sign treaties: no wealthy ponies trying to gain her favor through compliments and gifts. Everpony was busy, and she now had hours of free-time to herself. For the first time in what felt like an eternity, she actually was free to simply look outside and enjoy the clouds as the lazily floated over the Canterlot skies. It was beautiful, peaceful: something she wished others could simply take the time to enjoy, and-

A sharp flare of pain through her entire body startled Celestia out of her reverie, her mind's eye refixing itself upon her own interior. "What was-," she began, before another bolt of pain, not debilitating, but pleasant either, coursed through her body once more. It almost drove her to her knees, as it felt like every single neuron was suddenly on fire.

Then as quickly as it had appeared, it vanished, leaving Celestia, the beloved Princess of the Sun, gasping and trembling. She reached up with a hand and wiped her brow: thins beads of sweat coated the palm, running down in the lines upon her palms. Her pelt absorbed the droplets, but it did nothing to hide that fact that the pain had made her sweat.

"Could it be?" she thought, looking over her hand as the moisture finished spreading across her blazing white pelt. "Is it... is it time?" She turned and walked, on slightly trembling knees, mind you, back into the throne room. Walking up behind her throne, she waved her hand over the back: a small stone brick slid out of place, revealing a smaller lever.

With much trepidation she pulled it, watching as a small grinding noise emanated from the floor. Stones slid out of each other's way, eventually settling into place as a small, narrow staircase appeared. Celestia looked around and saw nopony was nearby: otherwise, she might have some explaining to do. Softly, she began to walk down the steps, her hooves making barely a sound as she descended below the floor of the throne room. Along the steps, small lanterns burst into flame, the light within the glass structures sending many dancing shadows down the steps. Above and behind Celestia the stones slid back into place, effectively sealing her in.

But she was no worried: there were many ways out of the chamber into which she was descending, and the stones above her were easily removed by the secondary lever near the top of the stairs. Still, it did feel like she had been sealed in some long-lost tomb, one from which none had ever emerged. The winding stone steps, long-forgotten by the ponies of the world, eventually flattened out into a room unseen by her own eyes in many, many centuries. Celestia's gaze was drawn to a great stone table, upon which several inscriptions were written in a language she had not needed to speak in a long time.

"Be alive once more," she commanded in her native tongue, the old language coming back to her like a familiar friend's face. With a burst of light the table's inscriptions filled with what seemed to be sunbeams, the brightness flooding the room. In the air, in clearly visible numbers, was a countdown timer: an odd thing one might see, but to Celestia, it was something she had not seen in a little more than a thousand years.

The numbers were familiar to her, as they would be to any pony in her situation. They were the countdown to something that only happened to an alicorn once every thousand years, give or take a few years. It was the beginning of a cycle that was as old as the alicorn race itself.

The heat: when an egg, a supremely divine egg, descended out of an alicorn mare's ovaries and into her uterus, awaiting the seed of a mate that would fertilize it and thus create new life. Celestia had only had one moment of heat before, and not knowing what to do she had left Luna in charge and went to talk with their parents on the High Alicorn Council. They had told her to find somepony to help her with it, but she was younger, much more stubborn: she had refused, and as a result, after her explosive heat, she found she had caused a coronal mass ejection from her sun. It had thankfully blown past her own little world, but the destruction it left in its wake had erased the last bits of atmosphere left on Mars. The last vestiges of life, single-celled animals put there as an experiment by some scientific alicorns as a possible terraforming experiment, combusted under the combining loss of atmosphere and the sudden cold snap that plunged the planet into a dry ice age. There was no evidence they had even existed.

She had caused a mass extinction by not sating her body's demands: she had wiped a planet of life through her selfishness.

Her horrified response was further enriched by the fact her sister transformed into Nightmare Moon due to a jealousy she had no idea her younger sister possessed. Using the Elements of Harmony amidst her grieving period, she banished her sister. Luna's banishment to the moon had, about halfway through, coincided with her own heat cycle. Her sister had had no partner, and so her own celestial body had behaved oddly: for an entire year, it alternated between normal, blood red, and a blue hue that never appeared more than once a month. Ponies at the time coined the phrase "once in a blue moon", and it had stuck with ponies everywhere ever since, only now it meant "never" instead of "once a month".

"19 days, 23 hours and 45 minutes," Celestia read off to herself, noticing how the pain she had felt had been fifteen minutes before she read these numbers. "I have a little less than three very short weeks until my heat hits me in full force."

Oh, that wasn't a going to be a huge problem: she'd simply leave the planet again, and then-

"No, wait," she said to herself, her words breaking that small, shred of hope she still had. "It takes at least four weeks to get where I need to go. I... I won't make it in time!" At this, she almost collapsed on the table, a small sob escaping her throat. It was going to happen again: she was going to cause a disaster of untold proportions, all because she had forgotten what was approaching her! The world was going to burn, she was certain of it: there was no way another coronal mass ejection would miss this time. Last time it had been pure coincidence that the planet had been on the opposite side of the ejection: this time, it would likely come from the same spot, and the planet would be right in the middle of it.

A puff of magical smoke temporarily snapped her out of her woe, and with a teary eye she looked up to see a scroll descend and land right in front of her. "Sleep once again," she choked out in her old language, watching as the timer disappeared and light faded from the great stone table. What was she going to tell her sister? What was she going to tell her subjects? Gingerly reaching out with one hand, she picked up and unfurled the scroll, her eyes hardly noticing the handwriting of her faithful student.

"Oh, Twilight, you and your friends have made so much progress," she muttered, rolling the letter up. "But I am afraid the Elements of Harmony cannot stop a coronal mass ejection, nor could they aid me in my retreat. I am so sorry." She wiped another tear from her eye, the scroll clenched tightly in her other hand.

"My selfishness, my forgetfulness, is going to cost this world everything," Princess Celestia whispered to herself. "Even if the atmosphere is not stripped, the magnetic field of the Earth will be irreversibly damaged. Every time a bout of solar wind passes by, the field will continually weaken, until it is gone forever. The atmosphere will dissipate, the skies will burn, the seas boil, and every living thing on this planet will cease to be. The Earth will become a barren lifeless husk, an everlasting monument to my failure as not only an alicorn, but as a just ruler." She choked back another sob: all life on this world would be gone, just like that.

"Well, except for the dragons, of course," she remembered, smiling in a sad sort of way. "The vacuum of space is no hindrance to their kind, nor is any true temperature fluctuation. They would survive, as they have for so... many... years."

Her eyes widened in surprise: of course! How could she have forgotten the tales? Her kind was not the first to govern over this world: long before the alicorns had evolved, another race, equally as powerful and likely much wiser had ruled for many, many millions of years ago. They were still around, having relinquished their control peacefully so that another race, Celestia's kind, could look after the galaxy.

Dragons had once ruled all, and right now what she needed was not a pony, but a dragon to satiate her needs. But what dragon would do this deed for her? The dragons of the world were reclusive, large and ferocious: they would no doubt try to use her for their own means, add her to a collection of sorts: her power may be great, but unless they were willing to be with her with no ulterior motives, her heat would never be sated and the world would still burn. After that, how many dragons would come after her, seeking revenge for the treasures and lands lost, for the friends wiped out by the ensuing doomsday? How many would she have to kill, in her celestial form, just to keep herself, and by extension her sister, safe?

All of those things aside, who could she ask to take such a responsibility upon themselves? She knew of no dragon with a heart willing to take such a risk, nor could she think or a dragon living in her borders. It was maddening: so close to salvation, only for a new obstacle to come crashing down into place. Plus, there was the whole problem of size compatibility, stamina, and simultaneous orgas-

"Wait," the princess said, looking down at the scroll in her hand. It was like many other she had received from Twilight over the years, the parchment the same design. The ink the same, written by a quill as always, but the message itself was nothing new. How it had been sent, on the other hand, was something unique, something only Twilight and her friends had a connection to...

"Spike," Celestia said, her eyes widening. Spike was a dragon, and no ordinary dragon at that! He had been raised in the pony world and taught to suppress and control his natural draconic instincts. He would not think like a normal dragon: in fact, he would think like a pony!

"It must be him: there is no other alternative," Celestia muttered to herself, turning and almost bolting for the stairs. "I must inform Twilight and her friends of this at once. They will need to... help me prepare."

A bit later, and Twilight was reading another small snippet of history to her friends: they were all rather bored, judging from their facial expressions.

'And so, with the defeat of the Mega-Hydra, the swamps of Southern Equestria were safe once more," the purple mare said, magically turning the page. "Then, following the-," There was a knock at the door, causing the purple mare to pause. "Who could that be?" she thought, turning to Spike. "Spike, could you please get the door?" she asked, turning back to her book. "I am just about to start on the portion of the Great Minotaur/Griffin War, and I don't want you to miss a single bit of it."

"Fine, sure: whatever," the dragon said, getting up and walking away from the near-comatose remaining Elements of Harmony. "Why does she think that's actually interesting all the time? I mean, sometimes it is, like that story about how Celestia came here, but griffins and minotaurs? Boooring," he thought. Twilight's obsession with books was beginning to become strangely time-consuming, but as always, he paid it little attention. Finally reaching the door and opening it, he was absolutely shocked to see none other than...

"Princess Celestia?" he asked, unsure why she looked at him with a sudden intensity. "What... what are you doing here?" If the princess ever dropped by their library home, it was usually announced, with a letter preceding her arrival. This was... unexpected, to say the least.

"I came to speak with your friends, Spike," Celestia said, brushing past him. "I will talk to you in a short amount of time, but for now, please stay here. I have urgent news to discuss with them which, in time, you will also learn about."

"Well, okay, I guess," the dragon said, staying where he was. The princess was never that brusque: just how bad had something become? What could this important news possibly be, anyway?

Celestia walked past the dragon, a chill running up her spine at her rather... uncouth treatment of him right there. He was the solution to not only her problem, but the coming destruction, and she had just treated him like she had few others! Oh,how it would have been so much simpler to just take him away, right there, leaving only a note for Twilight and her friends. But no: the princess was no dragon-knapper, and so she would inform Twilight ahead of time, if only to expedite the healing and acceptance process that the unicorn would undoubtedly go through. Spike had not left her side for many, many years: who was to say how she would react to news such as this?

"P-Princess Celestia! What... what are you doing here?" Twilight asked, nearly tumbling backwards off of her chair in surprise as said princess entered the room. The other five mares bolted upright, all signs of tiredness erased from their minds as they beheld their ruler.

"I have come with urgent news, my little ponies," Celestia said, remaining standing in front of the six mares. "There is a crisis about to befall Equestria: nay, the world, and I require assistance." Short, simple and to the point: there was no time for long-winded, grandiose speeches today, and truth be told, Celestia preferred skipping useless bits of information in order to get a message out quicker. That was why her letters were never really long, unlike her student's: Twilight Sparkle liked to ramble, for sure.

"How can we help, yer Majesty?" Applejack asked, arching an eyebrow.

"What is this danger?" Twilight asked, rising to her hooves as she did so. "Has Discord gone bad again? Are the Gates of Tartarus broken? Has Queen Chrysalis returned with an army to invade us? Has-,"

"No, Twilight Sparkle, nothing like that has befallen us," the princess said, her tone a far graver one than she was used to speaking. After all, the world was at stake, not just Equestria. "Within three weeks, there will be a coronal mass ejection from the sun, and... I will be powerless to stop it on my own."

"A what now?" Rainbow Dash asked, scratching her head.

"A coronal mass ejection, or CME: when the sun sends out a massive burst of solar wind and magnetic fields out into space. It... it can destroy or permanently damage a planet's own atmosphere and magnetic field," Twilight said, her eyes going wide in horror as she uttered the exact words from her astronomical dictionary. "Princess, if you cannot stop it, then what can we possibly do? I'm not sure the Elements of Harmony can stop such an... event."

"You are right, Twilight Sparkle: the Elements cannot save us. However, I did not say we are without hope."

"But, you s-s-said you w-w-would be p-powerless to s-stop it," Fluttershy said, hiding behind Rarity.

"I said I would be powerless to stop it on my own, dear Fluttershy," Celestia said softly. "However, this is something I cannot entrust any of you to do: I require another."

"But we want to help!" Pinkie Pie cried. "The world is in danger! We're all gonna diiiiiiiii-," she cried again before Applejack shoved a pillow in her mouth to shut her up.

"I know that, Ms. Pie, but you all simply lack the... tools I need to accomplish this task, and there is no spell that can protect you from this endeavor's dangers."

"But, if you don't need us, then... why did you come to us?" Rarity asked, her question filled with curiosity.

"Because, girls, I need your permission for what I am about to do," Celestia said, steeling herself. "Instead of the Elements of Harmony, I require... Spike."

There was complete and utter silence as the six mares took in the information. Then, Twilight, unable to contain it anymore, let loose a small stream of giggles. Brought on by stress, no doubt: many, many beings react to horribly bad or unexpected news with laughter, lest they just break down.

"What is so funny, Twilight?" Applejack asked, now more confused than ever.

"Celestia: I know you must have the best interests of the world at heart for this matter, but... Spike? I mean... what can he do that we cannot?" She was polite, but for the ponies gathered there, she almost sounded... indignant. Spike hadn't really done much in the way of grand, life-changing help other than save the Crystal Empire from King Sombra. She, and by extension her friends, had defeated Nightmare Moon and freed Princess Luna, defeated Discord and reformed him, and had helped defeat Chrysalis and her invading Changeling hordes. Besides, he was just so... young! Chronologically, anyway: would he even be up to a task like this?

Celestia was silent for a moment before the temperature in the room noticeable rose. "Twilight, I came to politely ask for your permission to bring Spike along with me for this mission, and I receive scorn and doubt instead?" Her voice was calm, but it carried with it the entirety of her regal persona. "Have you learned nothing of the values of friendship you so sorely needed those many years ago?"

Twilight visibly blanched. "No, I'm sorry princess, I didn't mean it like that. I just-,"

"Twilight, you have been a good student, but there are some things that not even you can do," Celestia said. "It is not your fault: nature has a way of limiting a pony, and these "limits" are things that not even I can overcome. I suggest you get ready for Spike to depart: I shall come for him tomorrow morning. I hate to tear him away from you all, but it is something that must be done: for the good of all. If everything goes well, he shall be returned back to you in three week's time, safe and sound."

"And if everything does not go well?" Fluttershy asked, her eyes ready to burst into tears.

Celestia sighed, a soft, sad sigh that made every other pony in the room want to start bawling their eyes out. "Then I suggest you make peace with yourselves. But do not fret too much: you will likely not even feel a thing before... the end."

With that, the princess walked away, stopping one last time to look back at the mares. "May I ask one more thing of you all?" she said softly.

"Yes?" Pinkie Pie asked, having spat out the pillow crammed in her cavernous maw.

"... do not tell anypony else of what is about to happen. I will not have this kingdom, should things not go according to plan, descend into a state of anarchy before the end. If we are to die, then we will do so with grace and dignity." She did not need to add that suicide would be far more painful for ponies seeking to end their lives than the death of the planet. She could not bear to have so many hurt long before the end.

The six mares nodded softly. "Nopony will hear a word from us, Your Majesty," Applejack said softly, removing her hat. "The only other thing we can say is, well... good luck, Celestia. We'll be counting on you."

"And Spike," Twilight Sparkle added softly, looking down at the floor as she did so.

With a heavy heart the princess finally reached the door, stopping by Spike as she did. "Be sure to be kind in your farewells, Spike," Celestia said. "They may be your last," she added, thinking it but refusing to say it. With that, she strode out the door, not looking back as she flew up and away from the library.

Spike, having not heard any of the conversation, closed the door with a confused look on his face. "Farewells?" he muttered, walking back to the others. "Twilight, what did she mean by farewells?"

The six mares looked upon him with a mixture of sadness, curiosity and disbelief. "Spike, please sit," Rarity said softly.

"What's going on?" Spike asked, doing as he was told. "Did the princess say something about me? Am I in trouble? Are you... are you all crying? What's the matter?"

"Spike, there's something you need to know," Twilight said softly, a few tears forming in her eyes. Behind her, the sun continued it's peaceful arc through the sky, nopony else in the country knowing that it would spell their doom in less than three weeks.