Sparkler chewed an apple thoughtfully as she flipped to the next page in her book, Sunset.  She couldn’t see what all the other mares had seen in it; from what she could tell, the main character seemed to be somewhat of a whiny little—

“Hello there!”

Sparkler slammed the book shut, looking up at the source of the voice.  “Oh. Hey Dad,” she said with a nod.

The Doctor gave her a boyish grin.  “Mind if I take a seat?” he said, gesturing to the couch.

“Oh!  Sure.”

He smiled.  “Much appreciated, my dear Sparkler!  What’s that you’ve got there?”

Sparkler groaned and held up the book.  “What, this?  It’s nothing.  Cloudchaser said I should try it, but I really have no idea what she was going on about.  The plot’s boring, the characters are uninteresting, blah, blah, blah.”

The Doctor put on a shocked look.  “Goodness!  You do seem like you need rescuing.  Well, fancy that.  You know how I still owe you a TARDIS trip from your birthday last month?”

Sparkler dropped the book, her eyes widening.  She stared at her father.  “We’re doing that now?”

He shrugged.  “Well, I do understand if you don’t want to, but…” He waggled his eyebrows at her.  “I mean, everyone should have the chance to sit down with a good book every now and again, and I’d hate to tear you away from such a riveting piece of literature—“

“I want to.  Let’s go.”  Sparkler sounded deadly serious, and more than a little desperate.  Her eye twitched as she leaned forward.  “Please don’t leave me alone with that thing.”

The Doctor laughed warmly.  “Oh, Sparkler.  Of course we can go.  Care to follow along?”  He stood up from the couch and gave her a friendly wink.

Sparkler smirked.  “Always, Dad.”

“So!” the Doctor said loudly, dashing around the central console of the TARDIS and flipping levers left and right.  “All of space and time, only half of which we’ve been to on family trips, so where do you want to go?”

Sparkler looked up from her seat on the side of the TARDIS with a bemused expression.  “I don’t know.  Surprise me.”

The Doctor grinned, pausing for a moment to hit a particularly large red button.  “Excellent!  I always love a new adventure.  Hm…where to go?  There’s the Black Hole of Neighstor V, the Shimmering Glacier in the Arlaponius System…”

He stopped in his tracks, and smiled slowly.  “No.  I have a better idea.”

In a flash, the Doctor was darting around the TARDIS computer like some kind of bird, whizzing about and slamming down levers, punching in numbers, and generally making gleeful mayhem.  Sparkler watched in some bemusement as her father hit one more button—

And that familiar screeching noise filled the room as the TARDIS began to disappear from Equestria.  Sparkler grinned in excitement, feeling the hairs on the back of her neck start to prick up in anticipation.

“No turbulence!  Fancy that,” the Doctor said with a chuckle.  “It’s been ages since the Time Vortex last gave me a trip without the occasional hiccup.  Good on you, old girl.”  He gave the TARDIS mainframe a friendly pat as Sparkler rolled her eyes.

With a slight hiss and another grinding sound, the TARDIS came to a stop with a small clunk.  The floor shook slightly, but other than that, all was still.  Sparkler gave the Doctor an inquisitive look.

“Well?”

He smiled.  “Go take a look.”

Giving her father a friendly grin, Sparkler nodded and took her first tentative steps outside—

And stared.

Outside the TARDIS doors stood an endless plain of smooth, black sand.  The ground was enveloped in shadows, darkness casting its eye over the desert. Certain grains of sand seemed to shimmer in a brilliant cascade of color, flickering from red, to green, to purple, and then to tints and shades that Sparkler couldn’t even name.

On either side of the desert rose a mountain.  The peak of each towered into the dark skies above, their tips disappearing into the atmosphere.  Their sides glinted an impossible cerulean pink, and reflected dully onto the colored sand. The base of each was so unmistakably huge that Sparkler didn’t doubt that each could have fit half of Equestria inside.

“Pretty, isn’t it?” the Doctor said, trotting over to his daughter with a grin.  He prodded her in the side with a hoof, and whispered into her ear.

“Now look up.”

Far above the tips of the mountains, a deep, clear black sky glittered above the plain of sand.  Sparkler felt as though her eyes were piercing into the depths of infinity as she looked into the ends of space, galaxies and distant quasars blinking furiously like tiny fireflies.

And then she saw it.

Above them, a huge star shone, its enormous body casting a thin stream of deep red light onto the world below. Four moons, creating the shape of a diamond in the sky, circled slowly in orbit around the planet below.  Brilliant trails of light, colored every hue of the rainbow, stretched from pole to pole, connecting the celestial bodies in a dance of light and wonder. And within that diamond, encircled by all the colors of the spectrum, shone a message, written in the stars:

HAPPY BIRTHDAY SPARKLER.

Sparkler gaped in amazement and awe as her father walked up from behind.  “Do you like it?” he asked gleefully.  “Took me forever to get the words right.  Did you know that this is one of only two places in the entire universe where you can find a constellation with that exact shape?  And in a serif font, no less!  Not to mention the tetranary lunar system, which I think is really quite—”

The Doctor was cut off as Sparkler leapt for him, wordlessly giving him a huge hug.  He stopped talking, and instead just hugged her back, holding her close to him.

“Thank you,” Sparkler said.  “It’s…it’s so beautiful..  You didn’t have to go to all that trouble, but…thank you.”

Her father smiled softly.  “But I did have to ‘go to all that trouble,’ Sparkler,” he said quietly.  Something old and wise twinkled in his eyes.  “I’ve been through all of Creation, but I haven’t really seen it until I’ve seen it with you.  My family.”

Sparkler chuckled to herself, wiping her eyes.  “Heh.  Could we just stay here for a little bit?  I want to remember this.”

The Doctor nodded.  “But of course!”

As she sat there, the Doctor taking his place a few yards away, a comet blazed its way across the sky, right through the middle of the constellation.  Its icy trail whirled around it as if in a dance, and oddly enough, it was soon joined by a larger comet, flying right alongside the first one.  Its tail was smaller and more controlled, but it glittered with the light of a thousand gems.  Sparkler smiled, and bowed her head.

A few minutes later, she stood up and wandered back over to the TARDIS.  The Doctor sprang up from the ground and trotted over, shooting a winning smile at his daughter.

“Finished?” he asked.

Sparkler shook her head, still smiling.  “Never.  But it’s enough for now.” With a few steps, she pushed open the door to the TARDIS and trotted inside.

“So!” the Doctor said, following close behind.  “Time to head back home?”

Sparkler looked thoughtful for a moment.  “Actually…could we head to the Gaming Centers on Mara Rossi VII?  Just as a quick detour.”

The Doctor winked.  “Any time.”