I sat back staring at Celestia from across the train room. "...Celestia...what's it like?" I asked, scratching my head. "This is something I wish I'd asked you before I died the first time, but what's it like ruling?"

Celestia scratched ear with a hoof. "Rulings is unique. All and all I can't really describe it as a whole. Ruling is made up of a lot of different parts. There's the ceremony, the drama, the intrigue, but I think the most important thing is watching your land grown, thrive." She laid down on the bed, mane spilling over the bed and bright eyes staring at me. "Twilight is my best example. I really can't describe how proud I am of her, but you've made your opinion of her quite--"

I waved her away. "Look, I was pissing out of my ass last time I talked to her. I wasn't in the best mood, I was angry, and I thought I could have my life back. But...things change, I don't really hate her...I mean, I was an asshole, but I really wish I wasn't." I straightened out my white coat. "Hindsight and all that...."

Celestia ran her hoof along the sheets. "You could apologize. And...I have to be honest about your little...display, it's not going to happen again I'm afraid."

I scratched my cheek, "You mean the domination.... It's gonna happen again, but maybe behind closed doors, and in secret, with contracts signed. I mean, last time I did, you walked me out in a crowd and I lost my shit." I scratched my nose, laughing gently. "Man...I said some crazy shit."

Celestia nuzzled a pillow. "Able, you know we're all allowed to have our kinks...but yelling it at my student wasn't really okay."

I shrugged. "I'm not going to lie, I do regret it. I mean...it was sex, and what am I gonna say it was good sex. But it was...it was very-" I rolled my wrist. "-heated."

Celestia giggled slightly. "You don't say. Well I never figured you for the kind and tender type."

"What, because of the war?" I rubbed my chin and walked over to sit with her. "I like romance...but you really gotta understand, going to dinner, spending days together, love, it's not exactly something I had back home." I rolled Celestia onto her side, wrapped my hand over her side and up under her hoof. "My romantic years were.... Well to be blunt, paid, pathetic, or mournful."

Celestia leaned her neck back, pressing her mane against my face. "Mournful?"

I mumbled softly, "...You smell like flowers.... Yeah...mournful. I spent a night with another soldier after a siege. I think it was right before I came through, we were just getting shelled, the girl just lost her husband to a mortar, and it was sloppy. I mean, it was midnight in a burned out house...it was just gross, sweaty.... Nothing like banging in a bullet proof vest."

Celestia let out a soft hum, "You know you always talk about what you did in vague detail. What was it actually like?"

I took a deep breath. "...If I tell you, you have to tell me where you lived."

Celestia went still. "You mean old Equestria...across the ocean...." She took a deep shaky breath. "It wasn't much different. There weren't as many mountains and everything was covered in trees. But...you go first."

I took a deep breath and hugged Celestia tight. "Where I came from is just cold, icy. It was green, but even the green was cold. I know it sounds like I'm complaining, but it was my life. I mean, we were the last outpost before the arctic, we lived in a barely livable shithole just to stay safe." I ran my fingers across Celestia's ribs. "I lived with maybe twenty other people until I was twenty. I hit twenty five and I signed up with an army that was coming to sort things out. You saw the people I was talking about, the people with-- Actually I look like them, looked, like them."

I rolled off the bed. "Men in white coats, fine uniforms, those masks. They were the best bet I had, and they offered my something new. I got to go down to Quebec, I got to go to Halifax, Newfoundland, then I wound up here.... It was always cold, but I was so used to it, and the green was beautiful." I wiped off my face, "If you ever get the chance, my time in Ottawa was the best. I got a month's leave there and it was the pinnacle of civilization. I mean, working cars, running water, it was amazing." I caught myself getting nostalgic and shook it off. "What about you? I never fucking asked, I wish I had, what was your home like?"

Celestia rolled over towards me. "Old Equestria... Fleet." She mumbled, "Would you believe me if I said I was a poor child?"

I stared at her. "You, grew up poor? Yeah, I do find that--"

"I grew up poor, pegasus and petite." Celestia nodded heartily. "I was one meter tall when I was coronated, and sixteen." Celestia looked up to the side. "No...seventeen. I was sixteen when we got on the boat."

I stared at her, slowly wandering around the room. "Wait...you're- you weren't always like this?" I pointed to her horn. "I thought--"

"I got picked, it was either me or another filly from Crown Rock. Sadly she took her own life when the time came to leave."

I glared at her. "You know, I don't know your history very well! A little enlightenment would be nice!"

Celestia laid down on the bed, staring at me with a soft broken stare. "I remember when it started. It came from the north. Everything just started freezing, even when ponies would try and thaw everything with fire, it just froze." Celestia rolled onto her back, dancing on the air. "They took me and Luna a year after everything was frozen. We were running out of food, everypony was sick, everything was frozen solid.... They told me I had to learn magic, they told me there was something inside me that could connect with the sun. I had no idea what that meant, but I got on the boats when everyone started heading east, towards New Equestria. I was crowned on a boat, turned into this...and told to lead everyone to a new home."

I felt my mouth go dry as she pranced on the air. "What...alone?"

Celestia turned her head to me. "Did you know I was orange? I had an orange mane. All my subject think it was pink, but I was orange and pink." She turned her head back to the ceiling. "After I was coronated I sat on a boat for a month, and by the time we landed I was told the natives had burned the ship with my sister in it. We...we took the first town we landed in, and the next, and the next.... We kept taking until we found her, she'd be saved by one of the thestrals, taken to Canterlot, I think they called it High Rock, High something." She let out a defeated sigh. "She's the only reason I stopped killing them. Luna was the only reason I stopped.... I mean, if I had my way thestrals wouldn't have existed past our arrival."

I rubbed my head and sat down on the floor. "You...lead an invasion...at sixteen?"

Celestia laid her head back. "Seventeen, and the war lasted until I was twenty one. I was so angry...so damn angry at them." She turned to the side, "I killed so many, burned so many. I banned pyromancy, once I realized how horrible I had been, once the rage cleared and I saw the bodies I promised myself I'd never kill again. I passed so many laws banning violence. I banished the ones who were left to that mountain town they have, I pushed the griffons back across the eastern sea, I shut down for at least three hundred years.... Able, do you ever wonder why we have a train but not a gun? It's because I forced ponies back, I kept them from advancing to keep them safe.... And they've been safe for so long...now your kind is here, like when the griffons came back...things get complicated and I really don't know what to do sometimes."

I let out a tired groan. "That's okay you know. Being confused, wondering." I decided to stop splitting hairs and level with her. "Celestia...you answer me in turn, okay?"

Celestia craned her neck around. "Hmm? What do you mean?"

"Quebec, sixteen shot, three stabbed, thirty seven blown up." I held up one finger. "Montreal, two shot, one beaten to death, seven stabbed." Another finger. "Edmundston, sixty blown up, thirty eight burned to death, one shot." I stared at her, standing up and walking over to her. "Those are the men and women I have either directly killed or have had a hand in killing."

Celestia stared at me, a lump rolling down her throat. "How? You're not--"

"I was a raider, a forward scout. Our job was to gather information, destroy as much as possible before the main force arrived and assassinate. Edmundston was a bomb, Quebec was battle, Montreal was a bar fight." I ducked down and rested my head next to hers. "...I'm waiting...."

Celestia stared eye to eye with me. "...Los Pegasus, thirty eight burned. Ponyville, six stabbed, two bludgeoned, twenty burned. Canterlot, one-hundred-thirty-two burned, one beheaded." She stated in rapid succession, without so much as a blink. "Their old king was a coward...he cried when his head was cut off."

I started laughing. "We're god damn terrible people. Man...this one kid back in Montreal, fucker tried to stab me with a needle, I stabbed him about.... Well enough times I had to switch knives half way through."

Celestia stared chuckling slightly. "This one thestral, wore tin armor and charged me. I broke my horn off in his stomach...had to wait a month for it to grow back...."

I nodded, rubbing the side of her chin. "I broke my hand on some poor bastards face, I think he died of smoke inhalation, if not well then the fire killed him."

You're both fucking psychos. Sam mumbled, clawing back into my mind. Crazy fucks.

I started laughing softly. "Celestia...your horn grows back?" I asked, petting her jaw.

She cooed softly as I rubbed her soft coat. "It takes a long time, it's all rather inconvenient but yes. I'd equate it to breaking a leg. Worst I've done in one-hundred years is chipping the tip off a few times." She stopped her laughing and turned to me, "Able...do you ever regret the creatures you've killed?"

I started laughing softly. "...Celestia-" I planted a soft kiss on the underside of her chin, "-I regret every single one." Next Chapter: The Dive Estimated time remaining: 52 Minutes