Six years ago

The leaves had just begun to turn on the trees lining Westgate Road, as Star slogged beneath a sweltering sun that fought its last, valiant stand against the encroaching chill of the fall.

The road was old; one of the oldest in Canterlot. From the wall of the royal palace it wound around the university's ancient Great Hall and ran west to the Opera House, which stood on the site of the long-vanished gate from which the road drew its name. Thanks to its central position in the city and its proximity to the University, it was home to academic offices and adjunct schools, and formed the core of the city's student district – a crescent of dorms, apartment complexes and converted townhouses that together played host to nearly the entire student body of Canterlot University.

Star halted in a sliver of shade beneath the tight-bound branches of an elderly birch. The Numnah Building rose before her, a slender affair that was crammed into a gap between the University Finance Office and the School of Alchemical Studies. She peered up at the narrow building's odd mixture of art-deco and what the more architecturally-inclined might call retromodernism, or some such rot, but which to Star had always appeared as little more than a horrendous clash of concrete, hearts and pointless lumps of chrome plating mangled together with what she assumed was duct tape.

Of course, she wasn't there just to gawp at the horrendous architectural choices of her peers. Star jabbed at the buzzer and stepped back. She didn't have to wait long before a voice warbled from a crystal speaking tube by the door: "If you're here from the college of music then I was totally not in the building when it happened and totally do not live here."

"We have a college of music?" Star raised her eyebrow at the scandalised gasp she received in reply. Artists. Always so high-strung. Or just high. "Never mind any of that. I'm here to see Twilight."

"Oh. Oh! You must be Star! Come in!" The door unlocked with a loud clank, before swinging open on a magically weighted hinge. "Sixth floor," the voice added, and then the speaking tube fell silent.

The lobby, lined with marble and lit with dim, but steady gas lights, felt more like the entrance of a comfortable restaurant or a hotel than any sort of institutional building; in her day the norm had been enchanted candles and bare wooden floors, or at least it had felt that way. Quite where the university had found the budget for this... Star snorted at the depths she had sunk to. Flicking her tail at imagined flies she marched up the stairs, with only a small pause to catch her breath on the fourth floor.

On the sixth, two doors waited for her at the narrow landing: one to the east and one to the west. The arrangement put Star in mind of the endless games sessions her son engaged in when he wasn't chasing the pink harlot or sharing his bunk with a few dozen lonely stallions at East Peak.

There was a quiet scuffling behind the nearest door; muffled voices whispering incomprehensible statements, or possibly threats, in which she could just about make out references to her name. She tried to spy through the peephole, but was met with darkness; instead she knocked, then stepped back as an abrupt silence fell within the apartment.

The wordless waiting stretched out for some moments. Star was about to knock again when the door crashed back and a bright green unicorn bounded out onto the landing. The mare grabbed Star's withers, flailing unkempt white and green bangs in her face, and flashed a horrifyingly wide smile.

"Hi! I totally don't live here and you have no idea who I am!" she announced, her words loud enough that they echoed in the stairwell for some time. She looked over her shoulder at the apartment to yell her goodbyes within, then bounded away down the stairs with the same disturbing grin still plastered to her face.

The confusing moment passed, Star tore herself from the receding tap of hooves upon the stairs and turned to face the door. She found Twilight standing there, draped in an oversized green hoodie that was emblazoned with the university's crest.

"Hello, Twilight," she said. Twilight smiled awkwardly and bobbed her head. "Enjoying life amongst the commoners again?"

"Mom..." Twilight took a breath and stepped back, though her smile remained, despite the tone of her voice. "You'd better come inside."

"Yes, I rather think I should."

Star edged over the threshold, casting a last glance back at the stairs lest the crazed green pony make an unexpected return. The door closed by itself as she followed Twilight into the apartment, passing through a shallow lobby and into a larger communal space. Couches and cushions lay haphazardly around the room, though a few were arranged in a rough circle around a low table, near a strip of full-height windows that looked out over parkland at the rear of the building. The hazy smudge of a small town was just barely visible on the horizon.

A mare and a stallion lounged near the windows, wrapped indecently about one another, the mare's blue coat clashing with the stallion's tan hide and bright orange mane. A door just lay open just beyond, leading to a short corridor that Star knew housed the actual dormitories. They both watched Star with curious expressions until Twilight shuffled into the room.

"Hey Twilight," the mare said. She eased onto her haunches, murmuring something into the stallion's ear that prompted a muted giggle from him, then smiled at Twilight. "Oh, your mom's here?"

"Yeah, finally. Mom, this is Minuette and Cracker." Twilight held out a hoof to the pair and gave a half shrug and an awkward twitch of her tail. "Minuette was in my classes at the school. Cracker—"

"Is just leaving," the stallion said. He rose from his couch, pausing for a languid stretch that somehow managed to show off his lean rump and the thick bands of muscle across his shoulders and neck, and also gave Star an eyeful of his cutie mark: a pair of crossed polo mallets.

Star frowned at the mark, then looked its owner in the face. "You look familiar. Didn't I see you playing for Cavelbridge in the varsity?"

"Certainly. I was Number Three last year. Crack Shot, currently reading law at Septine college." He twitched his head, flopping his oversized mane from one side of his neck to the other, and held out a hoof. After a moment's hesitation, and bouncing her head to rattle any unsavoury thoughts from her brain, Star bumped her own against it. "These two beauties like to call me Cracker for some reason. To answer the question you're thinking so very loudly, I'm here instead of there because I'm required to spend a year in harness to the City Watch as an advocate's assistant, and Canterlot offers more opportunity than Cavelbridge."

"I've never trusted lawyers," Star said. "Especially when they turn up in an unexpected places."

"I assure you the feeling about my situation was mutual, but it is a necessary sacrifice if one is to be seated on the bench and proclaim Celestia's law," he replied smoothly, then just as smoothly sidestepped Star to move to Twilight's side, where he wrapped his lean neck about hers. His narrow-eyed gaze found Star from behind the locks of Twilight's mane. "Of course, there are benefits."

A blush rose on Twilight's cheeks at the words, though she stayed silent. Then Minuette breezed past Star and flopped onto the other end of the couch beside Twilight, leaning in close enough that the poor mare was firmly sandwiched between the two. Twilight refused to meet Star's curious gaze, instead preferring to curl up on herself until her back hooves almost touched her elbows.

"I see," said Star.

They were all ignoring her now, curled in a ball of... not quite passion, or at least not in any sense Star would understand, but nevertheless in ways that seemed a fraction too intimate given her presence. But then Cracker's head lifted and he abruptly drew away from the two mares, pausing only to nibble affectionately at Twilight's ear.

"I shall see the both of you tonight," he murmured, transferring his gentle ministrations to the roots of Minuette's mane. "Perhaps at my apartment this time?"

"M-Maybe," Twilight stuttered. Her eyes flickered toward Star, before returning to a point somewhere beneath the floor.

For a moment Cracker seemed about to say something more, but then he sighed and backed away from the pair. "Ladies. Professor," he added, bowing his head to Star, before slipping past her and toward the door. Star watched him go, barely caring to conceal her appreciation for his sturdy frame.

The room became still, with only the faint clatter of the street below preventing absolute silence. Minuette was the first to move. "Perhaps I should find us all something to drink?"

She slid from the couch, leaving a parting kiss on Twilight's glowing cheek, and sauntered back toward the kitchen.

"Well," Star said once the door was closed. Her gaze turned to Twilight, who to her credit was no longer blushing. "You certainly have landed on all four hooves."

Twilight shrugged, though the motion was barely visible in the folds of her shirt. She was starting to relax now that they were alone again, like a mimosa once the rain had passed. "I guess so. Spike doesn't like it though. He wanted to stay in my rooms at the palace."

"In the same vein, I can't imagine your landlord is so keen on having a walking fire hazard around the place. Speaking of which, where is the little blast furnace?"

"With Princess Celestia," Twilight replied.

It was clear that vague answer was all Star could expect on the subject. Rather than press Twilight, she turned to give the spartan common room another examination before settling her gaze on the door to the dormitories, however unfitting the term might be for the near-palatial rooms that were undoubtedly the norm in such an opulent location. Curiosity tickled at her thoughts, and by reflex her tail twitched to bat it away before she could think to stop it.

"You know, when I was a student, I roomed with Velvet in a tiny little place down by the airship docks. Barely able to fit us both and Luci when we had him over, as I recall. Of course, your father has always been rather impressively proportioned." Star glanced at Twilight and grinned. "But never mind that! How about we see what sort of hovel they have you students slumming in these days?"

Before Twilight could reply, Star had fixed her jaw and was marching towards the dorms, though she faltered a little as she moved into the corridor beyond. Four doors lined the walls, two on each side, but Star's attention was soon taken from them. A window stood at the far end of the corridor, rising from floor to ceiling without any breaks and etched with intricate floral patterns that let in enough light to render almost pointless the scintillating crystal lanterns hanging from the ceiling.

The window kept Star's interest for a while, long enough to walk most of the length of the corridor without noticing. She paused then, just outside a door, and turned to look at Twilight once again.

"That stallion of yours seems like quite the catch," she said.

Twilight paused, one hoof in the air, like a deer on the verge of turning tail. A twitch ran from her eye and down her back to her croup, ending in a quick shake of her tail.

"He's well read," Twilight allowed. Then she lowered her hoof. "I almost wish I could go back to Cavelbridge with him next year."

"No love for the alma mater, dear? Not that I'm surprised. He does seem rather..." she licked her lips. "Persuasive."

"Cavelbridge has an excellent academic record!" Twilight tipped her head to watch Star prowl up and down the corridor. "Besides, he's the first stallion I've been able to have an intelligent conversation with since Shining joined the Guard."

"I imagine that's what you tell those three as well," Star shot back. She paused in front of a door, made a show of sniffing at the air and then flicked her ears toward it. "This one yours?"

"How did you know that?"

"I can smell the lab equipment."

Before Twilight could object, Star pushed the door open. Late afternoon sunlight washed over her as she stepped through, falling in long shafts from the rank of tall, arched windows that lined the far wall. Just beyond the threshold, Star halted; ahead of her was a desk scattered with laboratory glassware, including a retort nearly the size of her head and a copper worm that dripped steadily into a slender beaker.

"I thought I was joking," Star murmured, as she took in the view. Two beds took up the majority of the room, each with its own desk close to the wall. A bookshelf sat between them, filled to bursting and replete with the trinkets and mementos of student life.

Twilight squeezed past, ushering Star further into the room before turning to close the door. A poster hove into view, lurid and colourful against dull wood; Star couldn't help but recognise the fundamental laws of magic, even written as they were in such a stylised script. Around and between the laws there frolicked a bevy of cutesy creatures drawn from myth and lore, from mysterious realms and ancient dreams: strange apes and dragons and centaurs chased one another, or danced with ponies in togas and robes, whose heads were each crowned with flowery garlands.

It was all very twee.

"That—" Star jabbed a hoof at the poster "—is undoubtedly Twilight Velvet's work."

"Actually, Princess Celestia gave it to me," Twilight replied. She smirked when Star looked at her, then sauntered away to one of the beds – the scruffy one, Star noted, and not the one turned down neat as a high-class hotel.

"That was my second choice."

"Sure it was, mom." Twilight rolled onto her back on the bed and let out a plaintive sigh.

A book drifted past Star's face; she turned to watch it as it floated over Twilight, its pages riffling as it sought whatever spot she had last read to. Wrapped in her oversized sweater and splayed out on her back, uncaring toward the world at large as she fell into her book, Twilight could almost be mistaken for the bohemian ideal of studenthood that Star had once aspired toward.

With nothing else to do, Star shuffled awkwardly on her hooves and listened to the yawning silence surrounding the two of them. Somewhere in the apartment a door thudded – perhaps Minuette following up on her quest for drinks, or some other pony. Star wasn't sure how many lived here already. She found herself watching the young mare that her daughter had grown to be and wondering how time had caught up to her so completely.

Another door slammed, this time followed by the quiet murmur of voices and the stomp of hooves in the corridor. Star shook herself and moved across the room to a narrow shelf near Twilight's desk that held more personal mementos: a tiny orrery, a photograph of Spike. A Daring Do figurine that held her attention far longer than it had any right to. She smiled as she passed it by, before her eye was caught by another photograph Five mares smiled back at her from the frame, huddled around the barely comprehending Spike , happy and content together.

"This your little herd?" She held up the picture, turning it to face Twilight. For a moment Twilight frowned, as if trying to place it, but then she shook her head.

"Some of them are."

Star turned the photograph back to peer at it. "I take it some includes the green one."

"Lyra? Kind of. She's..." Twilight rolled onto her belly, ears twitching akimbo, as if searching for eavesdroppers. "We're in a lot of the same classes at the school. She tagged along when I started dating them, but she spends most of her time with Cracker and Putter."

"Putter?" Star glanced at the photograph again before putting it back on the shelf.

"Cracker's coltfriend." Twilight frowned as she spoke the words, while her hoof stroked gently along her foreleg. "We don't talk all that much."

"I see. And what about that clone of yours? Is she a part of this?"

"I wish you'd stop calling her that, mom."

"I don't see why." Star glanced over her shoulder at the sound of a creaking door; Minuette had arrived, bearing a trio of glasses and a suspiciously transparent bottle. "I suppose it's just a horrendous accident that she looks like you, talks like you, styles her mane the same way as yours and copies every single tiny thing you do."

"Oh, are you guys talking about Moondancer?" Minuette held out two glasses. Star took hers; Twilight declined with a wave of her hoof. "Yeah, she's pretty much Twilight mark two, right down to the whole 'no fun' thing."

"Moondancer is not my clone." Twilight's ears dropped back. "And anyway I have fun! I've read everything there is about fun!"

"Exactly, Twilight, you read it. You spend all day with your face buried in books and then Moondancer steals them afterwards so she can sit in her dorm and pretend she can still smell you on them." Minuette flicked her tail at Twilight's head and giggled. "Be nice if one of you paid that sort of attention to the rest of us."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"I'm just saying." Minuette shrugged and turned away to pour herself drink. "There are other uses for a face than reading."

"Min!" Twilight hopped from the bed, flashing Star an awkward smile before ushering Minuette across the room. "My mom is right here!"

The pair's conversation quickly reduced to harsh whispers, punctuated by Minuette's occasional, inscrutable glanced toward Star. At a particularly wild gesture of Twilight's hooves, Star cocked her head and ambled toward the pair, holding her drink up high and staring through it in an attempt to understand what it was."

Minuette was holding forth as she approached. "—the thing, Twi, I don't think she cares if you've had sex."

"But I—"

"Not interrupting anything, am I?" Star tilted her head and gave the pair what she hoped looked like a comforting smile. She raised the glass. "My dear, I wonder if perhaps it's a little early to be drinking something this strong."

Minuetted scoffed and rolled her eyes. "I sat through your morning lectures last semester, Professor."

"That's entirely different." Star tipped back the spirit in a single swallow, though not quite fast enough to prevent the cheap liquor from cutting to the back of her throat. "Besides," she wheezed, "you two have responsibilities."

"So do you," Twilight shot back. She wasn't frowning, though there was a little dimple in the centre of her brow, one that Star easily recognised from her mirror every morning.

"My dear, what I have is a horrible disease called tenure." Star held up her glass and peered through the film of liquor that crawled down its sides. "You'll understand once you've spent a few years lecturing."

Twilight's face twisted up. Then her ears fell back. "You—you think I'll end up like you?"

"I don't believe I said anything of the sort," Star replied as she cast about for Minuette's bottle, though it was sadly out of reach. "Only that you'll be very fond of telling ponies what to think."

"Hah! Burn," Minuette cackled, only to wilt beneath the combined force of Star and Twilight's glares. "A-Anyway, we don't have any lectures tomorrow. The other girls wanted to run the cider circuit, so I—"

"Figured you'd pre-game, drink too much cider and spend the next day nursing a hangover that feels like you were kicked in the head by a pissed-off donkey, yes, I'm well aware of the rituals." Star held up her glass and peered at the side, then set it down. She was already starting to regret that particular show of bravado. "I was a student as well, once upon a time. Of course," she continued, "I never started quite so early."

"Five o'clock somewhere." Minuette dragged a chair from beneath the other, empty desk at the foot of what was presumably her bed. "And like I said, I've sat through your morning lectures."

"You'd understand if you had to deal with my regular students."

"I am your regular students."

"My point," said Star, "stands firm."

Their slow circling of the room had brought Star back in range of the bottle. With a triumphant grin she picked it up and poured herself another drink. She was just bringing it to her lips when the door rattled and swung open without announcement and another pony, her magic laden with books, stumbled into the room.

"Twi, I got that copy of Space Princess Bluebelle you were—" the mare's voice trailed away as she caught sight of first Minuette, then Star. Her books fell to the floor. "Um."

"Ah, Moondancer," said Star, a broad smile on her face. "Nice to see you again. I think the last time was when you lurking at the back of my lectures on the abandoned temple-forts of Impalawe a couple of months back."

"Um," Moondancer repeated as she tried to pick up her scattered books. For some reason they kept sliding from her magic, possibly because her concentration was elsewhere.

While the performance wore on, Minuette shuffled her seat around to face Moondancer. "A couple of months back was the middle of the summer break, wasn't it?"

Moondancer blushed and glanced at Star once last time, before turning her full attention to the ragged stack of books now resting at her hooves. "Kinda? It sounded like it'd be interesting."

"I'm glad you thought so." Star settled forward and smiled benevolently – she hoped – at Moondancer. "Your hypothesis of recent occupation was interesting, but you failed to evidence it."

Again the books clattered to the floor, but now Moondancer wasn't paying them even the slightest attention. Ears splayed back, tail switching like a flag in a gale, she stepped over the pile to face Star.

Slowly, Star looked Moondancer up and down. She narrowed her eyes, while a lazy grin spread across her face. "You disagree?"

"Of course I disagree! The evidence for early abandonment was circumstantial at best," Moondancer replied. She shuffled to one side and started picking up her books again. "The entire hypothesis rests on the assumption that anything outside the walls of the temples wasn't related to occupation within them. If you had read my paper properly, you'd see that there were numerous examples of blue figure pottery in the temple at diziro mhara—"

"You mean in the garbage pits nearby."

Moondancer stomped her hoof. "That's my point! Those pits weren't used by any population other than the temple inhabitants and their vassal settlements!"

"Perhaps," Star replied, circling the younger mare. She picked up one of Moondancer's books to examine the spine. "Of course, there is the question of graffiti. Nothing more recent than five-hundred years—"

"The lack of low duncan inscription isn't evidence of anything other than a decrease in general literacy."

"It's a script written by donkeys, my dear, the last of which left the area centuries ago."

"But—" Moondancer lifted a hoof as if to step back, but then she ground it back into the carpet. "But that doesn't mean anything! It had to have been written by Impala as well! How else would they have communicated?"

"And if you had presented evidence of that, your argument might have carried more weight. All you have right now is belief." Star jabbed the book at Moondancer, who instinctively grasped it with her magic. The younger mare stared, sightless, at the book, while her breath came in short, hot bursts to match the rising flush on her cheeks. "It's a starting point. Nothing more."

Moondancer's frown was unmissable, thanks to the unkempt hedges she called eyebrows; so too the unmistakable quiver of her lip as she looked away from Star.

"You're passionate," Star continued. "But you took the assigned reading at face value and didn't look beyond it for any contradictory research."

Moondancer's tail whipped at her flanks as she returned her attention to Star. "You chose those texts for us."

"As an overview of the field," Star shot back. "And deliberately biased one at that."

Moondancer blinked and dropped her ears back again. "How was I supposed to reach a correct conclusion if you left out important information?"

"The entire point of the class was to encourage thinking beyond the obvious." Star reached for Minuette's bottle again, but then thought better of it. She glanced back at Moondancer; the young mare was pouting and glaring at her, but the uncertainty of a moment before was gone. "If it helps, none of the others thought to look either, though by the same stroke none of them drew even remotely as entertaining conclusions as yours, which is why you're the only one that scored anything higher than a C."

Moondancer opened her mouth but seemed unable to reply. Beside her, Minuette leaned forward across the back of her chair; it creaked loudly, distracting Moondancer from whatever fugue she had entered.

"So let me get this straight," said Minuette, glancing first at Star and then Moondancer. "You took a class in the middle of the summer break when you told us you were staying with your sister, didn't do the research and still got a B in a subject you don't even study?"

"I guess," Moondancer mumbled. Her eyes had risen to the book she held now, though her focus was several miles behind its pages. Then her head jerked around to the pile of books behind her; a moment later she gathered them up in a neat pile and trotted from the room.

After the door had closed, Star looked at Minuette and Twilight, and slowly raised an eyebrow. "Well—"

The door opened again. A book drifted through, depositing itself on Twilight's bed. Star waited for the door to close again, and then a little longer until she was satisfied that there'd be no more interruptions. Another door slammed in the distance; Moondancer returning to her own dorm.

"If I didn't know better—" Star paused to cock her ear toward the door, then smiled at Twilight. "I'd swear you two were sisters."

Twilight's outraged glare could have cut steel, though it faltered somewhat when Minuette burst out laughing and flopped backwards onto her bed. She rolled her eyes and turned her attention back to her book.

"I guess it's better than calling us clones," Twilight muttered.

The trio fell silent, save for a quiet snort of laughter from Minuette. Star shuffled back to her seat, while Minuette stared idly at the ceiling, still grinning and shaking her head; evidently she was easily amused at Twilight's expense, though perhaps that wasn't too surprising given the expectations that hung over these young mares. After a while, Star found herself contemplating the poster on the door again. It seemed childish in its whimsy. Like something – as she'd first suspected – that Twilight Velvet would have hung in her young filly's room.

"Speaking of sisters." Star turned to face Twilight, who looked up with a confused frown. "Lucent tells me that Guiding Light keeps asking when 'Princess Twilight' is coming back."

"Princess..." Twilight dropped her book. "She called me that?"

"Sounds like you impressed her," Minuette added, rolling onto her side. "Like, a lot."

"All I did was read to her." Twilight pouted and snuffled against her foreleg for a moment. "Granted, it was a book about Princess Celestia's adventures before she ascended the throne. And I might have illustrated it with some simple projection magic." Her eyes shifted to one side. "And maybe told her that it was Princess Celestia's personal copy and that we were good friends and that I would take her to visit the palace when she was older..."

Minuette giggled. "That'd do it!"

"But that doesn't make me a princess," Twilight protested, prompting another bout of Minuette's laughter.

"Fortunately, neither does sitting on a fancy seat and eating too much cake, otherwise we'd have princesses all over the place." Star settled back into her seat. "Youth is easily impressed by simple things. I remember idolising my cousin when I was a filly, for almost no reason at all now I look back on it. Lots of flashy lights and firecrackers. Hardly a patch on the sort of magic you girls get up to, I'm sure."

Minuette shook her head. "Not me. I'm studying Archaeology and Conservation," she said, then tapped her cutie mark and grinned at Star. "The only advanced magic I've learned recently involves dating historical artefacts."

"That would explain why you were in my morning lectures last month." Star scratched her ear and grinned at Twilight. "But what about our resident princess? Got any tricks to show your old mare?"

"Not unless you're impressed by stick figures acting out scenes from a foals' story book," said Twilight. She paused to turn a page of her book. "Though I wouldn't mind reading more about that dating magic."

"Yeah, sorry, Moondancer already borrowed my copy of Advanced Thaumochronology." Minuette snorted, then narrowed her eyes as her mouth twisted into a sly grin. "Unless you mean some other sort of dating magic. It's not like you'd have to look far if you wanted to get laid, Twilight."

"Min..."

"Fine, I get the picture." Minuette paused a moment to let Twilight's grumbling subside. She stuck her tongue out at her roommate and rolled her eyes at Star, perhaps forgetting their relative status for a moment. "So what about you, Professor?"

Star raised an eyebrow. "I'm quite alright for dates, thank you."

"She means about magic, mom," said Twilight, refusing to look up from her book.

"Oh, well, all that fancy stuff is for the birds anyway," said Star, with a dismissive wave of her hoof. "I only really use teleportation and light magic these days. You'd be amazed at how few ponies really appreciate the difference light makes to the world. Drop them in the middle of a wilderness without their thaumic lanterns and gas lights, and you'll soon see what they're really made of. That was something I discovered out I was very young, thanks to those brothers of mine and their endless trickery."

Minuette's ears perked up. "I never had a brother."

"I had three. I didn't realise how unusual that was until later." Star shook her head as a lopsided grin crept to her face. "Forget everything I said about youth being easily impressed, those three terrors were always trying to one-up every bit of magic I showed them. If I teleported one room away, they had to teleport across the entire house. Conjure a little crystal, they'd all turn up an hour later with gigantic geodes. Shine a light, they had to fill the room with darkness. They kept it up until the very day I left for University. I'm only surprised they didn't all try and get PhDs just to outdo me one last time."

"I can't imagine what it'd be like to have so many brothers."

"Sometimes it feels like my entire life was nothing but brothers." Star leaned back again, rubbing both hooves over her nose. "I'll tell you this, young mare. Be glad you weren't the lone filly surrounded by stallions, especially at this time of your life. They're more trouble than they're worth."

Twilight's book snapped shut. She looked at Star with a frown so similar to Moondancer's that it was all Star could do to not burst out laughing, but whatever she was about to say was interrupted by the loud crack of a door slamming and the rumble of hooves and voices as what sounded like an entire regiment of ponies invaded the apartment.

The call of an eager voice – the green one, Star recalled; Lyra – teased Minuette's ears toward the door. She hopped from the bed, but then paused to grin sheepishly at Star and Twilight.

"That's the other girls ready to go." She flicked an ear toward Twilight. "Sure you don't wanna come with, Twi? We're meeting Putter at the Nag."

Twilight shuffled on her bed, finally taking her eyes from Star. She gave Minuette a wan smile. "I'm—I'm fine."

"Alright." Minuette leaned over to give Twilight a peck on the cheek. "I'll see you later. Maybe we can all go hang out at the park tomorrow."

"Sure," said Twilight, as Minuette trotted from the room. She waited a good moment after the door had shut before turning her attention back to Star. "So. All brothers, huh?"

Star grinned. "I know! It explains a lot, doesn't it?"

Despite herself Twilight laughed, though only for a moment. She spread out on the bed, obviously relaxing now that Minuette was gone again, although Star hadn't noticed her daughter's tension before that point. How odd.

"It explains a lot," Twilight echoed. She raised her head to look at Star again. "Not everything though. I thought I was named after your sister."

"Amaranth?" Star rubbed the side of her neck. Perhaps she'd caught some of Twilight's tension without realising it. "I only said it felt like nothing but brothers, Twilight."

"I know, but it always seems—" Twilight sighed. "I've never met her. Sometimes it feels like she doesn't even exist."

"You've never met any of my family," Star replied. "Except your uncle Pickles, who I understand was very impressed with how verbal you were for your age."

"He kept cooing at me like I was a foal. I was nine! How else was I supposed to respond?"

"He always was a bit dense," said Star, with a shrug. She glanced around the room once again and then hopped from her chair, with nearly no pause to keep her balance. Perhaps that last drink had been a mistake. "Well, my dear, I really must get back to the university."

"Really?" Twilight's face fell, but she slid from the bed to join Star nonetheless.

The common room was empty when they reached it, though the musty scent of cheap beer and other more potent student pastimes still lingered to tell the tale of the crowd that Minuette had left with. Twilight slowed to glare at the abandoned cups and takeout wrappers piled on a table near the lobby.

"They're going to have fun cleaning that up," she muttered as she passed them by.

Then they reached the door, which hung ajar as if to cement the reputation of students everywhere as lazy and inconsiderate drunkards. Star teased it open and stepped out into the hallway.

"I shall have to do this again," she said, which drew another shy smile from Twilight. "Perhaps even bring your father or Crinkle along."

Twilight nodded slowly, but then her ears perked up and she grinned. "I know just the thing! I'm presenting a paper on comparative magic at the end of the month. Maybe you and dad could come see it?"

"The end of the month?"

"Yeah, the twentieth." Twilight's grin faded. "Why?"

"Oh, sweetheart..." Star reached out to touch Twilight's shoulder. "I can't. I have—"

"Another expedition," Twilight concluded.

Star could only offer a wan smile. "It's only six months. You won't even know I'm gone."

"No kidding," Twilight muttered. She looked up at the doorframe and sighed. "I hardly knew when you were home. Gone is normal."

The silence returned, but awkward now, as the two of them contemplated one another across the threshold. Star scuffed a hoof at the carpet and took a breath.

"I'll come by again before I leave," she said, and tried to smile again. Twilight didn't mirror it this time. "Maybe I can have a look at it then?"

Twilight nodded once, pursing her lips. "Maybe."

"I'm sure your father would love to hear it," Star continued, more for something to say than for any comfort the words might have offered. "And Velvet is always around."

Twilight's jaw clenched, briefly, but visibly. She began to push the door closed, then paused to stare at Star again, as if waiting for more. But Star, for all she claimed of her wit, could think of nothing else to say. Instead she stepped back, bowing her head to Twilight a fraction.

"Goodbye, Twilight," she said, and turned away. The door closed before she had even reached the stairs.