After the storm...

The city of Canterlot was deeply enveloped by the darkness of night. However, the normally beautiful starry veil that was ever so cautiously set up by the Princess of the Moon was once again obscured by the rampaging heavy storm that had plagued the sky like the previous days of this same week. Dark clouds poured water all over the landscape. As much as the sound of the droplets falling could be quite a relaxing sound for some ponies, the roaring thunder that came after every lightning strike, ripping the skies apart, could be quite startling for those who were not expecting it.

Relatively protected under his blankets, Sirius couldn’t help but to keep rolling over and changing position constantly on his large bed. The sound of the drops hitting the glass was an annoyance for him, even if the cub was pretty much used to it by now; until another roar of thunder came. It felt as if the very sky had decided to drop and explode inside his tiny little head.

Standing up and leaving his blanket behind, the young cub rocked his body from side to side, making his long ears wave from one side to the other. Inside his head, the annoying hum left by the thunder still echoed. Sometimes having such a sensitive hearing had its downsides.  His soft fur and feathers prickled up as he looked at the window and the great storm outside. Not being able to withstand this storm any longer Sirius decided to stop acting so tough and grown up and to seek out for his mother instead.

His tiny talons and hooves made faint sounds with every step as he made his way out of his room and down the main corridor. Since the royal bedrooms were scattered in different corridors for security measures he had to be sneaky and try to be as quick as possible, sticking to the walls for added camouflage as he turned at the corners in his way. After two parallel corridors he peeked from behind the wall spotting some guards at the door of his mother’s room. Of course he had free permission to come and go as he pleased, but his tiny body held a great ego. He didn’t want any guard thinking he was not a grown up colt nor that he could be scared by an insignificant storm like this one. With this thought in mind he raised his snout and pricked up his ears, as the collar of feathers around his neck fluffed up naturally. But as soon as he was about to step forward and reveal himself, Celestia came dashing out of her own room all excited and talked briefly to the guards as one of them followed her down to the other side of the lengthy corridor.

Tilting his head as he witnessed this, the fluffy cub took the chance to lower his body like a cat and quickly cross the distance between each corner. The remaining guard noticed the faint sound of movement and looked straight in his direction. However Sirius was well hidden, like a master of deception. Or at least that’s what the cub thought.

Holding back a snicker the guard pretended not to see the shiny silvery scaled tail just around the corner. Instead he looked to the other side as if there was something there. Exploiting this “silly mistake”, Sirius quietly snuck behind the guard’s back by pressing himself against the wall and swiftly entered his mother’s room. The sudden crackle of burning wood inside the fire place caught his attention for a moment as everything else seemed to be quiet. He started walking towards his mother’s bed and was ready to jump up in and finally get some sweet, well deserved sleep. That is if he had not spotted that weird, adorned, big egg that his mother and his “step-mother” always strangely caressed and kept it within their embrace for odd, long periods of time. Huffing and pouting at it, he climbed the bed anyway and sat down in front of the egg, putting his talons on top of it. Moving one finger, he lightly tapped at the resilient shell. Sirius didn’t know why it was there after all. He had always seen it on the golden pedestal, but before he could do anything else his long ears pricked up as he could detect an almost inaudible noise coming from inside the egg. The talon he had on top of it felt a vibration of something inside.  All of the fur on his spine stood up immediately and he looked down at it in a surfacing paranoid state as he slowly retreated, giving some space for the egg. His cute snout moved when he sniffed the air around it, scanning for any strange scent around. But suddenly it moved on it’s own onto the mattress, shaking from one side to another very gently... However the gentle movement turned in thrashing after some seconds.

Turning his ears back Sirius tried to reach out a talon and touch it again, and in the exact moment he tapped a certain spot on the shell, it erupted violently outwards with a lightning like kick that came from a small slender hoof and sent pieces of cracked remains of the shell flying in all directions. The cub automatically leapt backwards about 2 meters with his tiny wings wide open and looking like a distressed electrified ball of fur and feathers. 

That gooey hoof slowly gone back inside when some weird sounds of low screeching and wheezing came from it instead… Whatever was there, it started trying to kick around in order to changing position inside that thigh oval shape; Sirius was as bewildered and frightened as he could possibly be right now with his jaw mildly dropped, ears pinned down to his nape and wide eyes; seeing fur, slender legs, and a slender body covered in some strange egg goo as it made it’s way head first through the hole they had burst in the shell with their tiny golden hoof. Squeezing itself and breaking more of the adorned white surface, the creature still panted and wheezed heavily as it bashed it’s tiny hooves all around, frantically trying to crawl out of the crammed space it was stuck in.  For the young heir of the sun that vision was enough to terrorize him in every way possible. Standing at the tip of his talons and on his cloven hooves, his tail arched behind him naturally and so did his back, to pretend he was much bigger than naturally was at this moment. Hissing and clicking with his jaws open exposing both rows of sharp teeth... Just as another thunder blasted out there, putting Sirius on edge but also deeply scaring the hatchling foal, as it screeched in a high pitched horrifying scream. The young draconequus cub couldn’t help but to try and run away in response as he hissed in fear, and had his wings wide open; but exactly when he was reaching the door, the small cub collided upon a pair elegant legs but strong as tree trunks. Suffering with the recoil from the impact, he rolled on his back after his energy got thrown back at him and he lost all of his balance. Nonetheless, Sirius was quick enough to get back on his “hooves” In a matter of seconds. Looking up ready to deliver a childish like scowl at whoever he had stumbled upon, he was nothing less than baffled to discover he had indeed bumped upon his mother, Celestia, for his absolute bliss.

“Oh my goddess! Sirius, what is happening here…?”

The white Alicorn mare asked rather worried as she noticed the distressed state her poor cub was in. But despite that, Sirius did not had any second to explain himself as her gaze feel upon the hatchling that still frantically bashed their long slender hooves all around trying to free themselves from the remains of the broken shell; The creature was still quite scared by this whole scenario they were just thrown in; With the screaming, hissing, thunder… And the egg was not there to protect them anymore, and neither was their mother at first. Celestia quickly trotted over to the hatchling, immediately dedicating all of the attention she could ever have to offer… Sirius felt really indignant that she made him a question and didn’t even spare a couple of seconds for him to answer while looking at his face properly. However as the distance between his mother and the terrifying baby diminished, he panicked and jumped in her direction, hugging her left flank and with his whole body and trying to tug her leg backwards to force his mother to withdrawal from the menacing range of this bizarre baby.

“No! Mom, get away from that! It might bite you!”

Feeling his little sharp talons pressing against her skin and trying so desperately to pull her away, Celestia couldn’t help but to chuckle about how paranoid he was, much to Sirius dismay.

“Dear, if her bite shall be anything as strong as yours, I’m sure I’m gonna be just fine. And she is not a “thing” sweetie…“

Giving a brief caressing kiss on Sirius forehead, feeling his velvet fur, she managed to calm her son as he was insecure but still finally released her leg. As she turned back to gaze upon the beautiful little foal, her magic aura shone in a warm soft light, sparkling with and embracing the little hybrid’s body, it calmed her down as the magic dried her wet cold fur and warmed her up… Celestia cautiously removed the final remains of the eggshell; the glimmering reflection of the magic’s light gave the fragile semi-transparent armor, tail and mane of the baby’s a beautiful gentle glow. The poor thing was still panting slightly as it kept crying, still scared by everything that had happened so quickly sooner this night. But that was in the past now… And reassuring that everything was just alright, Celestia leaned down with a joyful expression and placed a little kiss just below her tiny horn.

“She is your new sister, my beloved fluff ball. “

Saying with quite the excitement, she looked by the corner of her eye while the small foal was finally ceasing to cry and wheeze, since it she understood her mother was there for her, and that now she was warm, safe and comfortable on top of the delicate mattress.

But surprisingly, Celestia did not received the reaction she was expecting as Sirius still had his developing wings unfolded and seemed still rather worried and frightened. His silvery scaly tail rapidly wrapped around his lower body, in a manner of both submission and a trying to make a “barrier” to protect himself against what was making him feel threatened in the first place. As his ears were totally pinned back, the cub’s fur gained suddenly a lot more of volume, making him look effectively slightly bigger than he originally was.

“But mom…” - He whined in a low tone with his eyebrows frowned. – “She looks like the stuff I eat!”

“Sirius! That’s no way to talk of your little sister, sweetie.” – Even if the choice of words of her cub was really not the best one, Celestia couldn’t deny it was slightly funny to think about it from the innocent point of view of her son. Turning her body slightly, she placed a hoof under his chin and looked into his eyes, with a warm smile as she explained. – “She might look a little different right now, but it’s just because she still need to grow a tough, beautiful and resilient armor. But still, isn’t she just gorgeous? She will grow up to become a gracious lady, and you’ll have to be there for her… Come on, try and pet her little one.”

Frowning further, Sirius couldn’t help but feel extremely insecure about all of this… He still didn’t have a full comprehension on the whole developing armor thing but… If in the past his wings looked like fluffy balls of light blue cotton glued to him, at least he could try and understand she wasn’t going to look like a walking book of pony anatomy in the future. He hoped. Cautiously approaching the filly he extended his arm as far as he possibly could to reach out for her mane; reflexively his tail wrapped around Celestia’s front leg tightly, trying to search for a small sense of safety.  

As his talons landed on her soft, fluffy mane, unexpectedly he didn’t receive quite the reaction he was fearfully waiting for. The filly only gave a small yawn and made a little clicking sound when she felt the small talons caressing her head in such a delicate way… Sirius slowly started to smile towards her without noticing it, and gave a quick glance to his mother to see how much she was overjoyed that he was starting to get more comfortable around his newly hatched sis. Everything seemed rather well… It was, until the baby randomly started dragging air in as if it was about to sneeze or cough; that was already more than enough to make Sirius start to withdrawal and regret to have heard his mother’s advice. About two seconds later, the changeling hybrid cough up small pond of acid on the floor and on the very corner of the bed… It was not potent enough to melt stone, but the fabric of the mattress seemed to be suffering slowly. However it all happened to quickly as Celestia could only witness a blue blurred image quickly jumping up as he leg got pulled… The feeling of needle sharp talons clinging onto her back, as she could already feel they sinking in very superficially while the cub tried to cling to her as close as he possibly could. Sighing for a short moment, the mare smiled as her horn lit up and fixed the small pool of acid and the burned mattress; the small pain she felt from the talons on her shoulder didn’t matter right now as she moved graciously around and lay down on her bed… She could easily feel Sirius was tense and on edge.

“Dearie, you do remember that you used to randomly sneeze up some pretty powerful chaotic fireballs all around, don’t you?”

No answer came back, but instead Celestia could feel him retracting himself as close as he possibly could to her body, and sighing deeply.

“… O-okay… Just gonna need time.” – A slightly distressed tone was still there in his voice, but at least he was making some effort to get used to this new reality… Now he had a sister. He would have to share his mother with that little cute bug… That could try and melt his glamorous fluffy feathers at any time. But even as his mind was still racing slightly, Sirius decided to look out of the window as he felt his mother tuck the little filly much closer to her body… Letting it feel her warmth, her presence; And letting she have her first taste of milk ever.

“You’ll have all the time you need, fluffy.” – Celestia calmly reassured as she started humming a little lullaby music to calm him down… Not that it would have any magical effect like Auntie Luna’s lullabies had on him, but it still worked pretty well.

The young draconequus couldn’t deny he was not particularly amused when his gaze meets the vision of the little bug horse bashing her head lightly against his mother’s udders, and his sensitive ears could hear clearly the suckling she was doing like a pocket sized black hole. It was easy for him to feel the Alicorn under him jerk very; very gently as she was surprised by the fact the little thing had some teeth already and apparently could bite.

…

The storm seemed to have subsided, as the flames in the fireplace kept cracking slowly and spreading warmth through the room… Unable to hold a yawn, Sirius felt flooded by a sudden tiredness; well it was nothing to be surprised since he should be asleep at two in the morning, because just like his mother, he was not one to be wake at night. The atmosphere around them now was so relaxing… The familiar smell of Celestia and her comfortable feathers and warmth rapidly knocked the cub off. As sleepiness took over his overworked mind and his nictitating membranes crawled over his eyes, the last thing he could see was a familiar figure, not particularly liked by him; entering the room with light the light sound of hooves filling the silence… He could briefly see iridescence colors reflecting all around under the light of the soft flame and the moonlight that finally decided to break through the dense clouds.

She was here, kissing her beloved princess of the sun. That filly was also there just by their hooves. Everything went black as his eyes finally closed and the sound started to become muddled and distant…  They looked truly joyful and happy. Even if he could also feel something similar, still there was a strange hole left somewhere in his tiny heart. 

They always said that after the storm there always comes a calm... Was it really the truth?

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Well, there we have our first story pic! I'm in love with this picture really and I hope everyone appreciates the bit of story there. In our verse, StarVerse,  Celestia has both of those adorable little siblings... But not everything is just flowers and rainbows.   marvelous colouring doing by my partner in the NextGen CrystalCaramel !  

Chracters mentioned: Sirius Sol (outdated appearance), and Harmonia.