"Do you think we'll be there soon enough?"

"We haven't even left yet."

"I know, but I can't help but to obnoxiously ask are we there yet?"

"Seriously, Shining?"

“No... sorry Cadence, I guess I'm just anxious. Haven't seen Twilight in a while,” Shining Armor sighed, fidgeting in place. He looked over to the castle's entrance constantly, checking for any signs of… anything at all.

“You know it's protocol,” she explained. “Besides, Twilight isn't going anywhere, and the guards will be here soon enough,” Cadence laughed, nuzzling his neck. “In any case, we can use the off-time to bond, don't you think?”

Shining rolled his eyes and grinned. “Cadence, we bond practically every night.”

Rolling her eyes in return, Cadence, gave him a light shove. “Captains shouldn't be acting this unprofessional, you know?”

“Prince,” Shining corrected. “Princes have a bit of that luxury in their own kingdom, right?”

“The point 'prince' is that we don't really travel. We've been here for months now, and we could use this as a relieve trip, so just enjoy it,” she finished, bopping his nose lightly.

Shining reached for his snout, wiping the feeling left by Cadence's hoof away. “Alright, I'll give you that… we really could do with less ponies constantly worrying besides us."

“Your Majesty!”

“Speaking of…” Shining groaned, looking to the side to a pair of crystal ponies approaching them.

“Your Majesty!” one of them bowed to Cadence. “Forgive our tardiness, but we have news!”

“The train will be here soon,” Shining whispered to Cadence.

“The train will be here soon,” the pony informed them.

“Who knew? Those are great news indeed,” Shining said with an air of importance, all while Cadence tried her best to hold back a laugh. “Well, let us go, then.”

They promptly left the safety of the castle and out into the chilly morning outside, with the sight of barely anypony walking around, Shining and Cadence smiled in delight.

“Good idea to leave early, Shining,” Cadence praised him. “We only got the letter from Spike a few hours ago.”

“Well, when you have to help Princess Celestia deal with her subjects, it's much better to deal with the fewest amount of them… it helps that I really want to go there already,” he admitted.

Giggling, Cadence nodded. “Honesty is a good trait for a ruler to have. You are on the path to become a fair Prince… and continue being an honest husband to boot.”

They looked at each other in silence before bursting into laughter, arriving at the newly built road that was a direct path to the train station. Cadence admired the handiwork with a smile, the time she had spend in the crystal empire coming to mind.

She had yet to become accustomed to her new position, though she felt she had grown to understand it better beyond what she had been taught, since the act of ruling hadn't come advertised with the 'protect the kingdom' package in her lesson. And as a rule to it, she always asked herself the same thing each morning.

“Why am I doing this again?”

“Because it's your destiny.” was the nebulous answer from Celestia that came to mind, and one she had questioned since. But destiny's track record made it a difficult thing to argue.

She was a fickle one… and so was destiny for that matter.

At least destiny didn't have a problem with having somepony substitute for two days while they were gone.

They arrived at the train station twenty minutes later, where the royal pair admired the renovated station. Shining didn't make it a long lasting experience, since they soon headed inside and took their seats.

“Hmm,” Shining suddenly hummed. “Oh-oh...”

Cadence tilted her head curiously, watching Shining rummaging through his bags. “What's the matter, dear?”

“I… may have forgotten something,” he groaned, pushing his bag aside after having looked numerous times. “Argh! Figures that the one time it's on me, I forget things.”

“What did you forget?” Cadence asked intrigued. “You haven't really explained this mysterious object."

Shining sighed. “Well, it was a gift for Twily. Something she might like."

“You should go get it,” Cadence suggested. “I'm sure we can wait a bit.”

“Yeah, I figure I should,” Shining said, resigning himself. “I'll be right ba-”

“Here you go, Prince Shining!” a pony suddenly said, making Shining jump in surprise and fall on his flank, breathing heavily as he stared at the unknown crystal pony, who in his mouth, held a book.

“Hey, that's my book!" Shining gasped, getting on his hooves and . “Where did you…”

“Your Majesty!” came the shouts from the guards who stumbled into the train, spears aimed at the pony who inevitably trembled in fear at the sight of them.

Ignoring his surprise, he quickly said. "Stop! He, um, this pony is simply bringing me something I forgot,” he said quickly, trying to appease the doubting guards, who didn't appear to budge at all.

Sighing, Cadence said. “I'll handle this.”

Just seconds later, the situation had been dealt with and the pony was on his way out. All the while, Shining stood in place, watching the situation be solved.

"New History of the Crystal Empire," he said out loud, looking at the book as he begrudgingly went back to his seat, groaning annoyed.

Cadence stared confused, watching him shove the book into his saddlebags. “You know, you don't have to be mad just because you dropped the book on the way. You got it back, didn't you?”

“It's not that,” he replied, turning away from his closed bag. “I have to come clean, Cadence, since I'm not sure if I'm really a match for this.”

“Match for what?”

“Me being a ruler,” he replied. “I know I joke a lot about this, but whenever things like this happen… you saw how it was going there with that pony,” he growled, barely able to hide his frustration. “On a captain day, I would be the one detaining that pony. But now? I don't even know how to react to this. I'm not prepared like you.”

Cadence blinked quickly, watching her husband who said nothing else, a distraught look marking his frustration. His eyes moved side to side, trying their best to avoid direct contact with her own, but despite his best attempts, she saw his hesitance.

Hesitance that seemed to mirror her own.

“Shining, I may have been a princess before all this, but that doesn't mean I'm the all-knowing ruler that Celestia is,” Cadence explained, joining him on his seat, and resting her head on his shoulder. “You should have told me you felt that way.”

Shining chuckled, shaking his head. “How does 'captain too afraid to step-up to responsibility' sound? I mean, trust me, I thought it would all be the same, but it turns out that I had become something that I, as a pony, was never prepared for.”

Reaching up for his ear, Cadence whispered. “Do you want me to tell you a secret?”

“Secret?” he whispered back.

“You are never truly prepared,” she began, getting a look of surprise from Shining. Noticing his silence, she continued. “You just have to make sure that what you say or do is the correct thing… and to be honest, even with all that I learned, it hasn't been a walk in the park for me.”

“Really?” Shining asked relieved. “How do you deal with it?”

Raising her leg, Cadence brought her hoof close to her chest as she took a deep breath, and arched it forwards as she released it. “Just need to learn to be patient, is all. I'm sure you'll get used to this soon enough.”

“Thank you, really,” he smiled, nuzzling up with her.

“Princess Cadence!” a pony interrupted their moment as he entered the room.

Quickly pushing him off (much to Shining's chagrin) she replied. “Yes, w-what's the matter?”

“We are about ready to head to Ponyville,” the pony quickly replied.

“Oh, thank you!” she said with a curt nod. “Anything else to report?”

The guard reached for his notes, looking for a few seconds before replying. “Not much, other than the fact that we'll be receiving an escort from Canterlot… it appears Captain Patch is currently in Ponyville.”

“Patch? You mean THE Patch!?” Shining quickly replied, now jumping over Cadence instead. “W-what is she doing in Ponyville?”

The guard pony raised a brow as he perused the papers. “Um, well, it appears that we didn't receive any information on that, I'm afraid.”

“I see…” Shining sighed. “Thank you, that will be all.”

“Well, you sure got used to it fast,” Cadence groaned, fixing her tiara which had been pushed off by Shining. “And did I hear right? Is this THE Patch who was your friend back in your guard days?” she asked curiously.

Shining nodded. “Yeah, she was,” he admitted, just as the train began suddenly moving.

“Well, that's great! You'll be able to catch up with your friend in just a few hours,” Cadence said happily, reaching into her bags, and taking out a book she had prepared for the trip.

Author's Notes:

And here we go, new chapter! Now, it isn't the chapter that starts it (I'm still working on those) but I feel I should post something in the interim.

Anyway, hope I can get them ready soon! Till next time!

Spoiler Notes 38 - 06/15/18
Interim chapter. Simply here to set-up events in the future. Nothing much to say other than me enjoying having these two talk. Nothing much to edit, either, which was very helpful.