The cratered landscape stretched out to the horizon, ashen, dark and lifeless. She walked along under the starry sky, her hair streaming back in a wind that existed in no mortal plane.

She had circled the equator so many times that her latest trails had obliterated the older ones. She had originally intended to step more carefully and use the earliest trails as a record to mark the passage of time. How long had she been here? The centuries blurred together. Her crenellated royal shoes had worn to nothing, their enchantment faded, and she’d discarded them long ago. 

It was harder still when the sister you’d loved all your life had simply abandoned you here, alone. But there was still a glow on the horizon, something that was worth walking for. 

She ambled on. Long absence had given her perspective. In her mind were the reflection of blue skies and green grasses, running waters and crisp fresh breezes, ozone of thunderstorms and the sharp smell of rain on hot rock. These things were distant to her, as if they were fever dreams of a place that had never been. 

The ash crunched under her bare hooves as she traveled. Here, the atmosphere was sparse and something that only an alicorn could process, and food and water were absent. But there were other means of sustenance burning in her. She’d made a covenant long ago and it still held strong. Love had kept her alive so far; it could do so for a bit longer.

She left the miles behind her in sedate steps as the red-gold glow grew before her. It wouldn’t be long now.

She passed along a low rille, black and glassy like obsidian, then passed by the end and climbed a steep ridge, reaching the crest, then scrambling down into a wide crater, its floor crazed with enormous crevices that caused fragments the size of houses to sit askew.

At its center was a peak, and from the peak there was the jetting plume of fire that soared up into space, curling in transparent streamers and ghostly flickers of plasma, casting its golden red light over all around it.

 The very last living flame on the whole of the burnt-out Sun.

Her white coat outlined with the glow of the fire, Celestia settled herself into the gritty ash, and waited.

In the sky overhead, a dim crescent showed the ravaged face of what had once been the globe of Equus. There was no moon in sight.

[hr]

Celestia waited patiently under the dancing, twisting flame until the arranged time, staring blankly into space. She had nowhere else to be.

Eventually, something like a comet approached, and Celestia watched as it slowly grew larger, shining even through the glare of the flickering solar flare before her. It smoothly took up a precise orbit overhead, a gleaming satellite in the heavens.

Ten minutes later, a flash of violet light gave a brief counter-light to Celestia’s form, and another alicorn appeared, shielded against the harsh environment.

Celestia read the message in her former student’s eyes as she approached. She was even taller now, a full sized Alicorn as Celestia had been in the first fires of her youth, and that confirmed the news.

“You found one that sang to you? I am quite relieved.” Celestia almost seemed to settle into the dust and ash.

Twilight stopped and stood several feet from her mentor. She nodded. “I am bonded. It has agreed to warm the new world we found, and to supplement my powers. In return, I will care for it and extend its life just as it will extend mine.”

“What is its name?”

“It chooses to be called Vahtane. I’d never really understood that [i]Sol[/i] was actually a proper name, both personal and individual. Part of it was that Sol never spoke to me as It did to you and Luna. I leaned heavily on that gadget of yours for a while.”

Celestia nodded.

“Vahtane has its own understanding of what Elements are, as well,” continued Twilight. “You were right that I can’t bring the old ones along; it has to bond with the sphere to which it gives light and life, and Elements, or things like them, should arise in time. But in the meantime, it’s hard to get along without them.”

Celestia smiled. “Sol was an old star when I bonded with it, Twilight. Its powers were more mature, which was both useful and disruptive. I hope Vahtane and you shall have a long and fruitful time together.”

“As do I. I can’t wait to get back to Vahtane and get started on the restoration…”

The ship overhead had left its tremendous cargo section behind in Vahtane’s stellar system. This section was overseen by seven Windigoes, who were keeping the precious contents frozen to as close to absolute zero as was feasible. Inside were the seeds of new generations of countless animals, birds and fish, along with genetic material for all of Equestria’s sapient races and as many mortal individuals as Twilight and her team had been able to preserve in the limited time and space that was available.

“…Not that I wish to cut this visit short,” finished Twilight. “I’m here for as long as you need me.”

Celestia gently shifted her weight as if she was a porcelain doll. “I am of course most happy to see you; still, it is best that we proceed directly. Did you have any more questions for me?”

“Yes. You said that Sol was old when you bonded with it. Why did you not select a younger star?”

“It was a plan gone wrong, Twilight. My… parents is too strong a word, let us say [i]progenitors…[/i] had managed to select a star whose course would eventually bring it into proximity with another star, at a time when the original star’s life was ending. From there, they hoped that they, or one of their offspring, could bond with that one and continue the life cycle for Equus. 

“But that younger star’s path was intersected by yet another that they’d overlooked, and that interloping star was Sol. They nearly collided, exchanging much stellar material and their momenta. The intended star was flung off course and Sol roughly took its position. Right at the point where the progenitors of Luna and I were hoping for a fresh young star, Sol was the only option we had, barring a long search that would put all Equus in jeopardy.”

Twilight drew a sharp breath under her force-field gas mask, but did not speak. 

Celestia continued. “There was another problem; with so little remaining energy available, only one of us could make the full bond with Sol. Our [i]progenitors[/i] left to seek other stars, leaving Luna and I to work out a solution that would preserve both ourselves and the burgeoning life on Equus itself. 

“Luna was younger and had less need for a stellar connection, though we still quarrelled about the issue longer than was wise. She bonded with the old star, and as its flames faded the core of it became the Moon of Equus. Its remaining power launched her into her span. She and I also bonded with each other, in a way; we called it being ‘Sphere sisters.’ After that, history unrolled much as you know it, until millennia after your Ascension, when Sol started to lose its fires.”

Celestia paused and stared into the sky, her pupils wide and as dark as the inky black between the stars.

“I’m… I’m still grieving after the Sundering. It’s like when I lost her before, during her exile, but I know this time that I won’t see her again.”

The Sundering had been a catastrophe that happened seven hundred years after Sol’s fires had started to fade. It had nearly put an end to all Equestrian life forever.

Discord, long bereft of Fluttershy, and Luna, seemingly bereft of sense along with her source of power, had torn up miles-wide sections of the land and the seas, and transported them to the Moon, which had then broken its bonds of gravitation and magic and sped off on a straight tangent into space, never to be heard from again in the millennia hence. Luna had not even said goodbye in any meaningful way, though the gaps in the land could be taken to be the characters of the “ch” phoneme. [i]Ciao?[/i]

“I can try to find her for you, said Twilight. “We’re still exploring the universe; Cadance’s team report that they are making progress. There is a chance we can talk to her and try to reason with her, bring her back to you.”

Celestia’s expression remained solemn. “It would not change much for me, I fear. You should certainly make peace with her should you encounter her, but bear in mind that unless she found an alternate star very swiftly, she must have been largely drawing the sustenance of her Alicorn being from Discord’s chaos magic. I am afraid that by this time, conversation with her would be difficult—”

The great flame flickered, jetted pure blue, and guttered in agonized surges for a long horrible minute, then resumed blazing in red-gold.

Celestia closed her eyes for a moment, then looked up to Twilight again. 

“We must conclude our business swiftly. Is there anything I can do for you, before you leave?”

“Teacher…” Twilight’s eyes welled with tears. “Please hear me out. I want you to come with us. I have prepared a vessel that can maintain the essence of your spirit, as I did with Spike and the other dragons. You, along with Sol, could start a new life with Vahtane’s aid. Please…”

Celestia gave a cavernous smile. “Sol will never leave here, and I will never leave Sol. This is a bond set in stone, Twilight, and you shall not change it. Let us not waste time considering what cannot be.”

“Then—” Drops of water fell and hissed as they merged with the hot ash. “I would hold you once again, one last time.”

“Dearest Twilight—” Celestia had no water left in her body to weep. “I wish this could be, but there is very little flesh and blood holding me together at this point. It is best that we do not try.

“But here is the gem from my peytral, which of all my possessions has spent the longest time at my breast. Do take it; though ancient, it may yet do you some good, and if it cannot, at least you will have something by which to remember me. And know, my dear Twilight, you and Luna, Sunset and Spike, were ever closer to my heart than this gem.”

She tore the gem from the peytral, which ripped like weak gold foil, and passed it to Twilight, who for a moment could not take it, as she shook and wept. Then she mastered herself, and at last, her magic closed around the gem.

“I wrought as well as I could with what I was given, Twilight,” said Celestia. “Take what I gave you, and wreak order and reason and goodness upon the world yourself, as best you may.”

“Farewell, Teacher.” Twilight’s voice was as tight and controlled as she’d ever held it. “While my own fire burns, the good you did will persist, and I will not forget you.”

The violet light flashed again, leaving Celestia alone and lit in orange once more. Her body seemed ashen, as if carved from pumice.

[i]Are you ready, Sol?[/i]

[i]I am, Celestia, if you have done all you need to do. Join me.[/i]

[i]I did not say it to her, Sol, but you were the closest. Always the closest, even when I had to push you aside.[/i]

[i]I understand. All that may have stood between us is forgiven. Join me now.[/i]

Celestia slowly stood, and walked forward into the jetting flame. The gas rushed around her, flowing firm and filling her wings. She spread them, and leaped up, spinning in the plasma flow, as she used to rise in the air from the sheer joy of making contact with her ancient charge. Her white coat gave off an intense glow as the dancing flame absorbed her, then her silhouette went dark and the darkness went skeletal and she became part of it all, her spirit merging with Sol. Higher and higher it reached, as if arching into a full flare as Sol had loved to create when It was a young star full of life.

Then the flame flickered, guttered, and collapsed. In the crater there was only darkness and the dying glow of hot ashes.