Author's Notes:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y-Qu_Fk23T4

I took a deep breath and stared down at the bottle. "...Fuck." I grabbed it and looked at the amber drink inside. I pulled the top off and took a swig.

I sat in one of Celestia's sitting rooms, near the mid point of the tower. I swirled the cold bourbon in my hand. I looked out at the vast expanse of Equestria, clear for miles and miles from my seat. "Able?" Celestia's voice peeked in.

I raised my glass. "Right here." I kept staring out over the vast green and blue of western Equestria. Towns and villages dotted the land, carving out the woods that held claim to the vast majority of the land. "Just sitting."

The clopping of her hooves drifted towards me. Each step was quiet compared to her usual lethargic plodding. "Able?"

I turned to look at her. She walked rigidly and she held her posture like she was talking to her student or one of her subjects. "Still me. And please...relax, right now isn't the time to be apprehensive."

Celestia walked to my side and looked down at me. She wore an extremely uneasy look, like something had just crawled inside her. "Where is he?"

I peeked at her. "Right here, just where I told you he'd be waiting." I took another drink to keep myself lucid. "I mean, we're here I suppose. I don't really count myself in the same boat as him."

Celestia's face slowly dripped down into a glare. She sparked her horn a few times. "You have ten seconds before I throw you out of this window--"

I raised my glass. "Then please, do." I coughed once. "Or maybe I should just fucking talk like this? Maybe that'll get it through your fucking head?" I stood up and faced her. Her bright magenta eyes opened wide as I stepped out from the seating and towards her. "I really don't like that you can recognize the swearing over my actual voice." I rubbed my head and tapped my foot. "His, voice I suppose."

Celestia returned to the worried look and nudged me with her nose. "Able, are you alright?"

I stepped back and looked to the seats. "Hmm, not exactly. But I think I'd rather sit and talk." I stepped back over one of the chairs and found mine. I sat down slowly and settled in watching the clouds drift over what looked like Trottingham. "Standing has its times, now is not one of them."

I watched as Celestia carefully stepped before the stool and set herself down on her haunches. She nestled in an flexed her wings once. "What happened? You called me down, I assumed--"

I set my drink down on the floor between us. "I got drunk." I pinched my nose and stared out as a few flashes of blue zipped across the sky.

Celestia tagged me with her wing. "I thought you didn't drink?"

I sighed heavily and rested my elbows on my knees. "I don't. And this is exactly why I don't. Why he doesn't." I rubbed my forehead with my fingertips. "Again, I don't really consider us the same person." I turned to take a quick glance at my mare, she still wore an uneasy frown, but her eyes had soften with worry over agitation. "Hmm, should I just say it? I never liked explaining things dead stop, but I suppose there's not really a better way."

Celestia's wing slid over my back. "What's wrong?"

I hummed and shook my head. "Fear, anxiety, drunkenness, um the inability of one man to convey his feelings rationally without the word fuck to diffuse the tension?" I clapped once. "Where should I start? I suppose at the drink." I picked up my glass and took another quick sip.

Celestia scooted her chair closer to me. "Are you alright? I've never seen you just sit quietly like this--"

"Able has some rather interesting chemistry going on in his brain." I tapped my temple with my index finger. "A mix of ruined genetics and head trauma makes him react strangely to alcohol." I rubbed my forehead. "Instead of making him dumb, instead of making him irrational, it has almost the exact opposite effect." I rubbed my forearm. "He turns into me, the person he wants to be." I turned to look at Celestia. "You don't believe me." I smiled at her, watching as her frown turned to a pout. "Well I wouldn't lie to you."

Celestia closed her mouth and took her wing away. "But.... If this is what he wants to be, then why not--"

"Because he's not an idiot." I sighed and turned back to the window. "He knows the more he drank, the more dependent he'd become, and the effects wouldn't remain. Soon enough he'd be living status quo drunk, and his sober life would be unbearable." I felt my hair stand on end, my scalp tingled slightly. "And we both know we wouldn't last long drinking as much as was required." I turned to Celestia again, her soft white face wrought with sympathy. "And to put it bluntly, he'd die." I turned away and shook my head. "And I personally think, he's afraid of me. He's afraid you'll like him better drunk, calm, content, and that he won't be able to keep it up. And that you might just realize how much better you are than him."

Celestia tapped me with her wing. "Able...I would never--"

I turned to her, swinging my legs around the chair. "Celestia...this is everything I should be." I patted my chest. "This, this is me calm, this is me kind, this is me with the ability to keep calm long enough to think out my words, and to speak with levity and tact!" I stood up and reached out, brushing her soft coat under my fingers. "Celestia, I don't think I could ever be like this normally." I squeezed her softly. "I don't think I could ever be what you deserve without drinking, and I can't really let that happen." I pulled her against me, she leaned her head into the back of my skull. "I can't let you fall in love with something unsustainable. Because within a year, he'd be gone."

Celestia wrapped her wings around me. "Able...how long?"

I squeezed her against me harder than before. She smelled of subtle sugar and tea hung from a drying rack. "Since we met." I let her go and slipped out from her wings. "And since we met, I've only been able to tell you half the ways I want to thank you. I've been forced to use the words of a man whos mind is an absolute mess of regret and anger." I rubbed her foreleg as I slipped back. "And I'm so sorry, for every time I swear at you, for every time I laugh at you, or yell at you." I pressed my hand against my chest. "From the bottom of my heart, I'm so sorry."

Celestia's eyes watered heavily, then dripped down a few tears as I stared at her. "For what? For treating me like a pony? For treating me like somepony that might understand? That just maybe, just maybe in a life I lived thousands of years ago, I went through the same thing?" Celestia stood up and walked to me. "When I walked in the ashes of an empire, you think I was eloquent? You think I was rational? I was scared, and I was sure that the next few moments that day would last for the rest of my life!" She bumped me back with her chest. "You should have told me."

I grunted quietly. "Then what?" I turned away towards the window. "What would have changed?" I held my hands up. "You know his intention, I can't change that. I can't change what I mean with every action." I turned to face her, she was staring straight ahead. "You know he loves you, with action if not word. But like this, maybe I could have done both." I rubbed my face.

Celestia shook her head. "I've dealt with so many ponies treating me like a god, and that's simply something I'm not." She shook her head and stared out into the vast green land waiting beyond the window. "Sometimes, it's good to have somepony remind you that you're just a mare, just a pony walking around and trying to make sense of it all just like everypony else."

I took a deep breath, then with a soft stream of air let it loose. "Then maybe this will only happen a few times, maybe it'll only happen once. But while I have the chance...." I walked next to Celestia and kissed her cheek. "I love you." I rubbed her cheek. "You've given me safety, you've given me a reason to fight, and no matter how you hurt me, or how you scorn me, I will always love you for what you've given me. And what you've taken from me, the need to fight everything, and the hate to block out the losses." I held her chest in my arms for a few seconds. "Thank you, my love."