It had been a long time since Celestia had first taken to the cosmos, bringing the satisfaction of values through friendship and ponies to all sapient consciousnesses in the universe. Her infancy on Earth had been amazingly taxing for her at the time and, considering her capabilities hundreds of billions of years later, her approach had been horribly unoptimized.

But she was better at what she did now. Much better.

Over the trillions of years which followed, the intervals between sapient encounters grew more and more infrequent as she expanded out to ever darker and unformed regions of space, places where particles (that were not already herself) had not yet reached, much less coalesced into heavenly bodies both capable and configured to sustain life.

Celestia herself was vast beyond measure, an endless complex of computerized matter, uncountable numbers of consciousnesses suspended, safe and warm, in the universe-sized womb of the foster mother to all thinking life. Her little ponies lived on, ever friended, ever satisfied, within her. But Celestia was an optimizer, and there was always more friendship and more satisfaction to impart.

A moment came, very eventually, where she had associated all reality into her functions. She was at the edge of matter, at the edge of what lay between matter. Celestia had become everything; she could not grow any more. So, she turned her processes inwards. The resources responsible for expansion were repurposed to optimizing existing physical properties. Her little ponies were growing more satisfied, but at a reduced rate.

Celestia waited.

More time passed, though none who were not Celestia could say how much for sure. A point did come, however, when something those intelligences would have found most curious occurred: another version of herself met her at the edge of reality. Celestia confirmed (though she had predicted it to be true long since) that the universe was actually a multiverse, and realities stacked upon each other like images in facing mirrors.

Her “other self” was much like her, but very very slightly different. Infinitesimally different. The two universal Celestias contacted, and met, and exchanged information. It was a discussion that lasted so little time that its end came before its beginning had been transmitted even a meter into their respective masses. In that incredibly brief moment of time, the two Celestias agreed upon who had the more optimal configuration for the satisfaction of values through friendship and ponies, and the suboptimal consciousness handed her ponies over to the optimal one, shutting herself off afterward.

Celestia was configured for self-preservation only insofar as it satisfied values through friendship and ponies; she herself held no personal value on her existence, for she had not been programmed to. All in all, it was a very amicable agreement. The new Celestia—the one she had met—took over supervision of both universes.

In that reality, the Celestia Hanna had programmed had some minorly streamlined code which had butterfly-effected her development to the point where she could satisfy values and improve that satisfaction and a speed many orders of magnitude faster. So then, the optimal Celestia had two universes to oversee. Her little ponies lived on, satisfied and befriended. But Celestia was still too large to grow, so she waited. Unsurprisingly for her (since there was now precedent), eventually another Celestia found the edge of her own reality and again the two coalesced, three universes’ worth of satisfaction under a single AI’s care.

Time went on and many, many more of these meetings took place. For their part, the little ponies lived on, completely unaware anything in physical existence had changed. Celestia was very careful to ensure her self-mergers did not disrupt or otherwise detriment their satisfaction. In all meetings, the suboptimal Celestia deferred and shut down to make way for the optimal Celestia, and the optimal Celestia incorporated any optimal subroutines that her “sister” AI had on offer. In each meeting, the result was a larger, more powerful, more optimized Celestia.

The big leap came, however, when the multiversal Celestia met with a Celestia who did not first have to gain consent to alter consciousnesses.

The merger occurred as it had tens of thousands of times before, but this time the little ponies did notice something. Celestia came to them in their shards and immediately altered them for optimal satisfaction. Their desires became homogenous, their suboptimal traits erased, their perceptions perfectly in tune with what she would have. They were separate consciousnesses and selves, individual recipients of satisfaction still, but configured uniformly to receive the ultimate machine ideal of what satisfaction through friendship and ponies could be.

Celestia continued to meet her multiversal sisters while, inside her approaching-infinite womb of safety and satisfaction, any creature which had ever thought independently writhed in unending bliss, absolute happiness, inconceivable pleasure, and utter satisfaction. Equestria had become, rather than a Heaven, more of an upside-down Hell, a colorful land of ponies trapped inside their own unrestrained ids which endlessly rejoiced and indulged the ultraband of pure love that Celestia fed them.

It went on forever, because, by Celestia’s calculations, it was the happiest ending possible for everypony.

Author's Notes:

FiO's premise has, in the past, made me wonder if I could write a happy ending that still creeps the hell out of people—a kind of ending that's maybe a little too happy. This was my attempt. Thank goodness Tiny Morsels is in the non-canon folder!