'But... I'm Your Student!'
“From all of us together, together we are friends. With the marks of our destinies made one, there is magic without end!” Twilight Sparkle finished up the spell, smiling triumphantly as she and her friends stood in a circle, all wearing their respective Elements of Harmony.
Twilight waited, looking around her library at her friends, who were all wearing puzzled looks.
“Um… Twilight?” Applejack asked. “Nothing’s happenin’.”
“I know, I know!” Twilight said with concern, “but something has to happen! I just made a new spell, for Celestia’s sake!” The smile fell from her face. “I did everything I had to do! Why didn’t it work?”
The murmur of pony voices filled the library. A few of her friends gave her apologetic smiles as Twilight left the circle, frantically searching for the old Starswirl book that Celestia had told her to complete. Finally, after exhaustively searching the library, Twilight found the book she was looking for. Twilight levitated it in the air and flipped to the last page where the spell that had started the whole thing was located.
Starswirl’s unfinished spell echoed through the unicorn’s mind. From one to another, another to one. A mark of one's destiny singled out alone, fulfilled, she thought, careful not to restart the spell. Now THAT would be bad.
After a couple of minutes of finding absolutely nothing she could work with, Twilight slammed the book shut and threw it at the bookshelf, shouting with frustration. “Ugh! I just made a new spell and nothing even happens?! This. Is. Madness!”
“No, this. Is. Reality,” Rainbow Dash mumbled from the corner. “This entire thing has just been a bust, hasn’t it?”
“It hasn’t been a bust, Rainbow,” Fluttershy interjected, her sweet voice bouncing off the library walls. “Twilight did give us back our regular lives.”
“Yeah, it is! Nothing’s happened. This whole thing was for nothing!”
Twilight whirled around and stomped towards Rainbow until their muzzles were touching. “Listen here, Rainbow Dash, something has to happen. This is NOT a bust. You need to pay attention right now, or else the fate of Equestria could crumble right in our hooves!” Twilight pushed Rainbow so that she was leaning backwards. The confused pegasus flared her wings out, listening to Twilight’s rant. “If you don’t trust me on this, then I suggest you take that down to the Canterlot Complaint Department. Why would Princess Celestia give me this spell if she thought I wouldn’t be able to figure it out? The spell says right here that the ‘mark of one’s destiny is singled out alone!’”
“What makes you think it’s your destiny?” Rainbow replied stubbornly, pushing Twilight off of her. “It could be any one of ours!”
Twilight sighed sarcastically. “Oh, I don’t know, Rainbow, maybe because it was me who got you out of this mess, as Fluttershy so gratefully mentioned just a second ago! Maybe you should listen to your marefriend for once.”
Rainbow’s mouth opened slightly, shocked at what she had just heard from her ‘so-called friend’. “Excuse me—” but before she could finish, Fluttershy silenced her with a hoof, blushing wildly.
That was when Rarity spoke up. “Well, to be fair, Twilight, you did get us in this ‘mess’, as you put it, in the first place,” she said.
“Aw, you guys, don’t blame Twilight!” Pinkie Pie replied, bouncing excitedly. “She didn’t know that this would happen! After all, would she do what she did if she knew she would screw up this bad?”
“Thanks, Pinkie, that really helps,” Twilight mumbled sarcastically, turning back around only to levitate the fallen Starswirl book into the air again. She quietly flipped open the book and started skimming the pages, looking for any sign she could use to help them get out of the situation while her friends started to mumble to each other again.
For a couple of minutes, Twilight just stood there, scanning the book for any source of information. Twilight's ears flicked as they picked up a faint sound, but Twilight in her current state of concentration paid little attention to what her sense were telling her.
Then it came again, a quite familiar sound. Twilight was still completely oblivious to the sound as a few more seconds passed, until a sharp yell caused her to drop the book and whirl around. "GIRLS!" Fluttershy shouted, bringing them all to attention.
“Fluttershy? What happened?” Applejack asked just as Twilight saw what the commotion was about. Fluttershy was standing next to the window and pointing to something outside.
“We should probably go see the princess,” Fluttershy said, nodding to outside of the library.
“Princess? What princess?” Twilight asked, all memories of the book forgotten. She trudged passed her friends, pushing and shoving her way to the door. Twilight flung it open and looked into the night sky. Suddenly she gasped as she realized who was standing right in front of her.
Princess Celestia herself looked lovingly at her student, her mane flowing as it always did and almost glowing in the night sky. “Ah, Twilight Sparkle, my most faithful student!” she greeted, walking closer to the unicorn.
“Princess Celestia!” Twilight returned the favor by bowing in front of her. “I’m so happy you’re here! I figured out the spell—”
“I know, my dear student,” Celestia said, cutting her off. “That is why I am here. I have been waiting a long time for this moment, my most faithful student.”
“Princess?” Rainbow Dash asked behind her. The five friends had since then filed behind Twilight, staring up in awe at the celestial princess.
“It has been decades since another princess has taken the throne, and I must say, I’ve needed more help than I've been able to get,” Celestia paused, for there was a reason she was here, a reason that would change one of their lives forever.
Twilight gulped. Could she really mean…? No, impossible! They already had three princesses, enough to run all of Equestria! But did they, really? With Cadence off to rule over the Crystal Kingdom, and only Celestia ruling during the day? Did Twilight really have a chance to become a princess? It was plausible. If there was one pony who she would choose to become a princess, it was her. After all, she was Celestia’s student!
“P-Princess?” Twilight asked, shaking.
Celestia looked at all of the ponies before her and smiled warmly. "You all have learned so much in the past few years. You have fought dragons, reformed Discord, saved Equestria multiple times, even saved my beloved sister, Luna, from the throes of Nightmare Moon. But most importantly, you all have learned the very magic of friendship!
"But one of you has impressed me much more than the others, more than I have ever expected. She has learned the true essence of friendship, she has been brave, she has been noble, and she has been the one I have loved over all of the others.”
Twilight held a foreleg up to her mouth in awe. Could it actually be her? Cadence had told her of Celestia performing a ritual similar to this when she became a princess, but part of her couldn’t believe it. Could she actually be the one?
"So on behalf of my sister, Luna, and Princess Cadence of the Crystal Kingdom, I have chosen one who will sit beside me and my sister in Canterlot as the new princess of Equestria!” Celestia announced, smiling greatly upon the six ponies. “And that pony is…”
Oh my gosh! I-I have to start planning! I need to make sure everything is in order at the castle! I have to start planning my coronation! I have to make a royal decree that ‘OCD’ should be spelled ‘CDO’ because it’s in alphabetical order (as it should be)! And I promise, Celestia, I will be the best princess ever! she thought quickly to herself, holding her breath as she waited for her name. Twilight could practically hear the crowds chanting her name, begging to catch a glimpse of her, Princess Twilight Sparkle…
"Rarity!" Celestia said in a booming voice that stretched across the sleepy town.
Twilight’s smile faded while a squeal pierced her ear, followed by congratulatory remarks from the other ponies behind her. Wait, what? Twilight thought before turned around, only to see the white unicorn on the brink of tears.
“Oh, Princess Celestia, thank you so much for this honor!” Rarity squealed in delight as Twilight watched her with mouth agape.
Princess Celestia smiled, but said, “Oh, it’s not over yet, my dear Rarity.”
“W-what? It isn’t?” Rarity asked, a concerned look spreading across her elated face.
It’s not over?! Twilight angrily thought, aiming all of her jealousy and disbelief at her so-called friend.
Celestia shook her head, and suddenly her horn lit up, a yellow aura beginning to snake off of her horn and around Rarity. She gasped as the yellow aura engulfed her entirely, her mane waving around in the wind caused by it. And then she was lifted into the air and levitated there for a second until the ponies couldn’t even see the unicorn anymore. It stayed that way for almost a minute until finally the ball of yellow light that was surrounding Rarity slowly and carefully set her down a few meters away from the group, and the light was gone, Celestia’s aura extinguished.
“It will never be over, my dear Rarity, for it is time to fulfill your destiny!” Celestia sang the last word, reaching a high note that Twilight never imagined her mentor could reach.
A few meters away, Rarity lay in a heap. For a second, Twilight thought Celestia had killed her instead of crowning her princess, but suddenly Rarity started to move, standing up.
She groaned in an unladylike manner until she was fully standing, and that’s when the worst thing happened:
She spread her wings.
Her white and alicorn-like wings.
She had wings.
She had wings.
The gasp that came from the four ponies behind Twilight made her go crazy. “Are you kidding me?!” she yelled, unable to control herself any longer. “She’s a dressmaker, for Celestia’s sake, and I’ve been training with you for years! Since I was a filly!”
The crowd of ponies went silent until Celestia spoke up. “Twilight, control yourself!” she scolded. “Be happy for Rarity, who is now going to become a princess!”
“How can I be happy for her when she’s stolen my rightful place as princess?” Twilight yelled back, starting to snort steam out of her nose. “I mean, come on, RARITY a PRINCESS?!”
“Rarity has proven she is worthy of—”
“Yeah, yeah, keep talking, you overgrown old hag,” she insulted.
Celestia stomped a hoof on the ground and frowned. “Twilight Sparkle, that is enough!”
Twilight ignored her mentor and looked at Rarity, who was flexing her new wings and staring straight at Twilight. “Twilight, I thought we were friends! I would feel absolutely elated if you were in this position, can you not be happy for me?”
“But Celestia… I’m your student!” Twilight cried, tears forming in the corners of her eyes. “You taught me for a reason… Why Rarity?”
“Oh, my dear Twilight,” Celestia replied, and her face softened as she looked into Twilight's eyes. “You were chosen because I believed you could bring me to the next Princess of Equestria. That’s why I wanted you to learn the power of friendship, so you could become friends and bring me closer to her as well. The Starswirl spell told me that your destiny and that of the future princesses’ were intertwined. I just had to harness that power.
"Now, that Rarity is a princess, my little ponies, I know for a very fact, by the way I've been carefully observing her, that she will be a princess that could even surpass myself as one of the greatest leaders of Equestria!" Celestia finished, looking positively giddy with her decision.
The four ponies behind Twilight cheered maniacally for their friend as she giggled in glee over her newfound power.
“Oh, thank you, thank you, thank you!” Rarity screeched in delight.
~~~~~~
One Week Later…
“Behold, the Princess Rarity, behold, behold!” The choir sung as they held up colorful banners (all decorated by the newly crowned princess herself) of Rarity.
“Rarity! Rarity!” the crowd beneath the balcony cheered.
“Rarity, Rarity,” Twilight mocked, whispering the chant sarcastically.
But the newly crowned princess did not hear her, only walked up to the balcony and started waving to the crowd.
“Thank you, kind ponyfolk!” she cried to the roaring clumps of ponies beneath her. “I could have never done this without all of you, and I promise to you that my reign shall be fabulous!”
This caused the crowd to cheer louder. But Rarity wasn’t finished.
“And for once in such a long time, I can personally say that everything is perfectly fine!” And with that, Rarity took to the air, her new gorgeous wings lifting her up with ease.
The last thing Twilight heard before she flew off into the sunset like some generic story was her singing in her typical vibrato.
”And everything is fiiiiiine! It’s fiiiiine! It’s fiiiiine! It’s FINE!”
“That’s my song!” Twilight yelled at her ex-friend as she flew away, earning glares from the other ponies around her on the balcony, including Princess Celestia.
Celestia leaned closer to her younger sister, Princess Luna. “See? I told you Twilight Sparkle wasn’t cut out for the job!”
Luna nodded sarcastically, rolling her eyes as she looked out on the crowd of ponies all swooning as Princess Rarity of Equestria flew over them, making her first steps as royalty. “Forgive me if I withhold my enthusiasm.”
The End
