The court of Canterlot Castle was already abuzz. Things had been proceeding as usual, with the Court of the Day handing over the keys, as it were, to the Court of the Night, when both Princesses had suddenly vanished from the palace. No warning had been given, no instructions had been made; they had simply both announced that they would be back shortly, and vanished in twin flashes of light. Word had gone through the palace staff like chain lightning. The heralds and hoofservants were at a loss for what to do; the courtiers and supplicants were either miffed or alarmed as was their natures; the guards were disgruntled that the Princesses had yet again teleported off without them,  just underlining-- yet again, dammit-- how damned pointless their jobs were.

Everypony was rushing about the throne room, working their way well into a proper tizzy(1) when there was a loud report and a tremendous flash of light. Celestia and Luna appeared in the middle of the floor... accompanied by (shock horror gasp scream faint) six other alicorns. Every pony in the room froze in wide eyed, slack jawed shock. "By royal decree, the Royal Court for this evening is cancelled," Celestia said firmly. She swept out her wings. "Guards, I want every pony cleared out of this room. Yourselves included."

The captain stepped forward. "Your highness?"

"Leave us." Celestia said, chin raised high. Luna said nothing, simply standing by her sister with her own wings fanned out.

Slowly, at the behest of the guards, the throne room cleared out. The double doors closed behind the last two guards with a hollow boom. Celestia held her pose for another minute. "Are they all gone?" she muttered to her sister.

Luna peered around the throne room, looking carefully for any well-meaning but disobedient servants lingering in hiding. "I think so," she said.

Celestia lowered her wings and sighed with relief. She and Luna looked over the six new alicorns gathered around them, sprawled dizzily on the floor. Then they looked at each other, grins spreading across their faces.

To Twilight's astonishment, Luna broke into the happy hoofy dance.... and Celestia was right behind her. "Eeeeeeee!"

"Yesyesyesyes!"

"It finally happened---"

"YyyyyES!" Celestia and Luna High-hoofed each other.

Twilight watched in astonishment as the most regal ponies she knew proceeded to go into a demented victory dance, squealing and giggling like schoolfillies. At the point they started doing hip-bumps she interrupted. "Princesses? Luna? Celestia? What is this??"

At Twilight's distressed tone, Celestia stopped in mid hip-bump. "Oh, Twilight. Aheh. Um." The diarch of the sun blushed. "Well this is something we have been looking forward to for some time, and we-- oh stop that Lulu!" She gave her sister-- who was still doing the happy dance-- a hip bump that sent the lunar princess staggering off the dais. "As I was saying... this is an event we have been planning for since, well, since--"

"Since we were fillies!" Luna said as she climbed to her hooves.

"You mean this-- this--" Twilight waved a wing at her still slightly croggled friends. She sat down and groaned in frustration. "Celestiaaaa! I thought we got past that whole 'secret chessmaster planning' thing--!"

"Now Twilight," Celestia chided, "Let me explain." Twilight sighed but complied. "Now when I say we were planning for this, I mean that we have known for ages that it had to happen, sooner or later, and have been patiently waiting for it to happen."

"Beggin' yer pardon, Princess," Applejack managed, "But waiting for what?"

"For other alicorns," Luna interrupted.

"My little ponies, Luna and I have been the only alicorns in existence for literally thousands of years," Celestia said patiently. "Do you imagine we enjoyed being all alone all those centuries?" the Bearers sat back, pondering this.  Celestia's face turned somber. "You cannot fathom how lonely it was. All we have had, was each other. My sister's banishment-- you have no idea how close it came to undoing me entirely." Luna stepped forward and nuzzled her, comforting. "We have been looking, watching, waiting for signs that more of our kind would be born, that this loneliness we have lived with for so long would be ended. We also labored to share our immortality-- to find the secret to our endless youth, to share with the rest of ponykind. Again, to no avail."

"It was only in this last century that I started seeing signs that our solitude was ending... in a way we hadn't quite expected."

"What were the signs?" Twilight asked.

Celestia grinned. "I think you can figure out the first one," she chuckled. "It's how you got your babysitter after all..."

Twilight brightened. "Princess Cadence! You saw her ascend?"

"I saw her born," Celestia said. "Quite the surprise for us. She was born a normal Pegasus--- for all of five minutes. Then she ascended. (2) Luna and I were born alicorns... we had no idea before Cadence that normal ponies could become alicorns."

"I had been watching," Celestia pointed out. "For signs of other alicorns, anywhere in the world." She waved her horn and an enormous map of Equestria and the surrounding lands appeared in midair. "I only saw a few possibles, over all those centuries," she said. The map sprouted three or four bright red dots, scattered over its wide surface. "Massive magical surges, strange disturbances in the Aether.... I had thought them false leads. But after Cadence's birth, I had to reassess my data. Where once I had seen a few possible sparks... there were now quite a few more." Dozens of dots suddenly speckled the map. "But to my frustration, my duties as Princess-- and the imminent return of... of Luna--" she looked askance at Luna, who flushed awkwardly. "Meant that I could only investigate one or two." She gave Twilight a wry grin. "Then I got a student and my hooves were really full." Now it was Twilight's turn to blush.

"Then the next, no-doubts-about-it sign happened," Celestia said. "Six ordinary ponies found the Elements of Harmony. Or should I say six extraordinary ponies.... ones who, had I been more observant, would have been obvious candidates for possible ascension."

"Us?" Fluttershy squeaked.

"Of course. Remember what I told you? Do you really imagine that anything but a pony of extraordinary potential could perform a sonic rainboom while still a school filly?" she looked at Dash, who was still looking a little freaked out about the horn growing out of her own head. "Or detect a vein of gemstones from miles away?" Here she looked at Rarity, who blushed and fluttered her wings. "Or communicate with animals as naturally as breathing--- when she had never seen a wild animal before in her life?" Fluttershy 'eeped' and smiled.

"And let us not downplay the more subtle gifts among us," Celestia continued. "I have watched Sweet Apple Acres for some time now, and it is by far the most bountiful orchard in that region. But to have the gift to raise magic-infused apples from the Everfree--!"

Applejack flushed. "Twern't me that did that," she said. "That was all Granny Smith and Great Grandpa."

"And yet you made them thrive," Celestia pressed. "With only yourself, your brother, and your little sister to tend the whole farm. And let us not forget your ability to see through lies."

Pinkie cocked her head. "How are those two things related anyways?"

It was Luna who chuckled. "When you till the earth, you must learn to cherish the truth, to accept it no matter how comforting a lie might be. You learn that no amount of falsehood or self-deception will change the way the plants grow, or the waters flow, or the stones rest. What is, is, and you must accept the truth of it, if you would prosper."

" Heh. 'Apples is Apples,' is how Grandpa allus put it, " Applejack reminisced.

Celestia turned her attention to Pinkie Pie. "And don't think my sister and I haven't noticed your unusual gifts, Pinkie," she teased.

"What, you mean my Pinkie Sense?" Pinkie said cheerfully. And strangely disingenuously.

"Just for starters," Celestia admitted, cocking an eyebrow. "And no, trying to distract everypony is not going to work this time. We're well aware of how things seem to.... bend around you, to your favor."

Pinkie Pie suddenly looked unsettled. "Gee, I really dunno what you're talking about, then--" She looked around, almost as if she expected something to happen.

"Pinkie," Celestia chided gently. "That won't work this time, I told you."

To the other ponies' surprise, Pinkie seemed to shrink in further on herself. Her eyes widened into teary pools. "But I can't," she said cryptically. "It's bad if I tell..."

To her friends' mystification, Celestia stepped down off the dais and threw her wing around the cringing former earth pony. "It's okay now, Pinkie," she said kindly. "I'm sorry I didn't see it sooner; I should have been there, and intervened, taken you under my wing..."

"Princess? Wha....?" Twilight looked around at her friends. They looked as puzzled as her.

Luna stepped down off the dais and joined her sister in nuzzling the inexplicably distraught pink pony. "Pinkie is a Bender," the night princess said.

"A what?" Applejack said, her brows furrowed.

"A Bender. Or a Warper, is another term for it," Celestia said. "It's a rare variation of earth pony talents. A Bender can bend things. Time, space, even probability--chance and luck--"

Twilight gasped and leapt to her hooves. "Of course! That's how she keeps popping out of places she couldn't have possibly got into! That's how I saw her in the mirror that one time! That's how she could win a dozen games of tic tac toe in a row! That's how her Pinkie Sense works-- And that's probably why I kept getting beaned with falling flowerpots whenever I tried to investigate it," she said, rubbing her head ruefully. "AHA!" She pointed at Pinkie Pie and did a victory jig. "I knew there was a rational explanation, I knew it all along! I knew it I knew it I... knew... aherm. Right." She sheepishly stopped dancing as the others stared at her. "Sorry?"

Celestia gave a wry grin and continued. "Anyway, Pinkie was obviously a Bender from a very early age. Had I paid more attention in the times we met I would have seen it. And I would have done something to help her..." She looked at Pinkie.

Twilight gasped again. "The Ill-Starred!" The others looked at her. "That's... what ponies used to call ponies who they thought brought bad luck," Twilight explained. She looked at Pinkie, comprehension dawning. "And I bet most of them were Benders, weren't they."

"Insightful as always, Twilight," Celestia said, nodding. "Most Benders can sense when things are going to happen. Some can just barely tweak the cosmic fabric, and make things happen, sending good or ill luck other ponies' way. Especially if they're worried or upset or defensive. And if they don't know what they're doing, it's hard to control."

"I didn't mean for you to get hit on the noggin, Twilight," Pinkie whimpered. "I just wished so hard for you to get tired of investigating me..."

"That it suddenly rained flowerpots on my head," Twilight said wryly.

"Pinkie was prodigiously gifted. I'm guessing that her family saw her... unusual proclivities.... and warned her to never let anypony know she was... Ill-starred." Celestia said the word with obvious distaste.

"Pa and Ma always said it was a bad thing," Pinkie sniffled. "That bad things would happen if anypony knew." She shook her head. "But ponies started to figure it out... At least in Ponyville I could start over--"

        "You mean Pinkie had to leave her family 'cause the neighbors thought she was jinxed?" Applejack said, dismayed. "Aw, sugarcube..."

"I wish I had figured it out sooner," Celestia lamented. "I would have done something to help her. But I'm doing it now. Pinkamena Diane Pie, listen to me." Pinkie looked up at her through her waterfall of a mane. "You don't have to hide your gifts anymore. Understand? Your parents were just trying to protect you from ponies who would fear or resent you. But that's over now. You're a very special, very gifted pony, and you should never be ashamed of that."

"Even if I'm Ill-Starred?"

"You are not ill starred," Celestia said. "You're a Luck-Maker." She surprised the pink pony with a kiss on the forehead. "And don't you forget it."

"Does this mean I'm your new Faithful Student?" Pinkie asked suddenly, brightening a little.

Celestia chuckled. "Well, I think you'll be more our Faithful Student, Pinkie," she said. "You will need a bit of training to work out the kinks in your abilities. I can help a bit, but Luna has more of a knack with luck, time and space magic."

        "And the rest of us will be right there for you too," Twilight said firmly. "Right girls?" There was an overwhelming consensus to the affirmative.

Rarity dabbed at her eyes with a hanky. "Oh my, tissue time," she said. "This is all very heartwarming-- and enlightening, too-- but you were saying about other alicorns, your Highness?"

"Just Celestia, from now on, Rarity," Celestia said. "You're all alicorn princesses now, and we are family-- not ruler and subject. But my, yes, I have drifted off the topic." She waved her horn. the hovering map rolled up, shrank, and multiplied into six copies. "You know of my plans for Equestria," she said. "To someday end the scourge of mortality upon our little ponies."

"It is not good that some few should be blessed with endless youth, while so many of our subjects wither like flowers cut from the vine," Luna said somberly. "Long have we sought to share our gift of longevity and youth with others."

"But to do that, we need more alicorns," Celestia said. "We few are not enough to crack this puzzle on our own... or at least not within many lifetimes. And none here is willing to wait for that, I think." The bearers all let their thoughts drift to friends and loved ones, some more saddle-weary with age than others.... and more than one thrilled to the idea of them being young, healthy and strong again. "We need more alicorns. Their magic, their insight..."

"Their bloodlines?" Rarity suggested.

"Ahem. Indeed. It would be good to have more alicorn lineage in the gene pool, yes," Celestia admitted. "To this end, as new alicorns of the realm, I would commission the six of you to go forth and seek out these possible ascendants." She levitated a copy of the map to each of them. "It will be some weeks before your quest will begin, and there will be much to arrange after the coronations. But I would urge you to be..." she paused. "Not necessarily secretive. But please be very, very discreet in to whom you disclose your mission. Not all would have good intentions towards our cause-- or to the nascent alicorns who may be out there, unknowing." Several of them gulped, but they all nodded.

"I think I'm missing something," Rainbow Dash said. "Why didn't you send out other ponies to try and track these nasty alicorns..."

"Nascent, Dash," Twilight corrected.

"Whatever. Why didn't you just send somepony else to look? Why does it have to be us?"

Celestia shook her head. "As foals, my sister and I learned many things about our nature. If an alicorn doesn't wish to be found, they won't be found," she said. "Save by another alicorn."

"It made for most frustrating games of hide and seek," Luna reminisced.

"In fact, it is our affinity that will hasten the work; nothing can seek out an alicorn as readily as another alicorn."

Luna suddenly cleared her throat. Loudly. Several times. Celestia sighed. "Yes, Luna, I'll tell them," she said. "Girls, I believe Luna would like you to exercise certain preferences in which potentials you seek out first..."

"Um, certain preferences?" Twilight asked.

"I'll give you a hint," Luna said, deadpan. "How many alicorns do you now know?"

"Well, uh, all of us and Cadence, I guess," Dash said.

Luna's eyebrows could have served as a level. "Notice anything missing from our happy little herd?"

"Uhhhh..."

"Stallions," Celestia said, rolling her eyes. "She's saying she wants you to keep an especial eye out for any nascent alicorn stallions."

There was something of a raw, awkward pause. "Um, not to get too personal," Twilight said. "But... couldn't you um, date a regular--"

"I did once," Luna said tragically. No further words need said.

Twilight of course said them. "How long ago--"

"Five hundred years before my fall as Nightmare Moon," Luna said. "Do not mistake me, Twilight Sparkle; I loved Blue Yonder more than anything. But he was gone... so quickly." She looked heartbroken." Would you not do the same? How could I possibly fall in love again, with somepony who would be gone like a breeze through my mane? I swore then I would hold my heart only for a lover who could be with me for the ages."

There was a chorus of 'awwww's. "That's so sad--" Twilight said.

Luna leaned forward till her nose was an inch from Twilight's. "And on a related note. It's been fifteen hundred years, Twilight. Fifteen hundred bucking years since the last time. You get where I'm going with this?"

"The last time since wha oh dear, um...." Rarity blushed.

"Wowch," Rainbow Dash muttered.

Luna nodded. "Exactly." Her eyes got a little round. "I'm starting to get... just... a little.. TENSE."

Twilight leaned back from the lunar princess. "Rrrright. We'll keep that in mind, then--"

"We'd better," Rainbow Dash said, her own eyes a little round. "I don't wanna go a thousand years without, y'know, intimate male companionship either."

"Oh my," Fluttershy said, alarmed. She cast a sidelong look at Celestia. "Um, Prin-- um, Celestia, don't you--?"

Celestia sighed and tossed her mane. "Of course," she said. "I'm just better at controlling it." Luna stuck her tongue out at her. "Mind you, there are summers when some of the royal Guard start looking mighty darn good--"  There was a crash just outside the doors; the distinct sound of a soldier dropping his weapon and possibly his helmet. Celestia just smirked.

"But alas, I can't quite bring myself to be a cradle robber," she finished in a low whisper to Fluttershy.  "What the hell. I guess it wouldn't hurt keeping an eye out for someone tall, dark and alicornish for me, too...."

Fluttershy blushed and giggled fiercely.

Celestia stood up straight, spreading out her wings. "Thus is your mission, from ourselves to thee; to go forth across the land, seek out our alicorn brethren and sisters and bring them safe to Canterlot; to set the foundations of the alicorn race; that we might bring the blessings of alicorn longevity to all the clans of ponydom."

The bearers of the elements of Harmony all knelt. Applejack's head suddenly jerked back up.

"Hold yer horses," she said. "Did she say something about us being princesses?"

1) 3/4 of a tizzy. Just shy of a rumpus and a fair margin from a full blown furor.

2)It was quite the event. Screaming, panic, shouting, flailing hooves-- and that was just the expectant father.  In the first month, within a five block radius of Cadence's nursery, there were fifteen marriage proposals, five weddings, seven second honeymoons, and every single schoolcolt spontaneously decided that girls didn't have cooties after all.

Next Chapter: Chapter 3 Estimated time remaining: 9 Hours, 19 Minutes