Twilight was doing her absolute, absolute, best to keep a warm, thankful smile on her lips as she stood at the forefront of the royal balcony, overlooking the courtyard of the palace. And the thousands of ponies packing the insides, here to honor the Elements. The lost Elements… For the briefest of moments… it faltered. A splash of pain, of loneliness. And of course it was noticed. It was always noticed. A warm, broad wing stroked along her back slowly. Big. Celestia, as per the usual. But…
“We light the brazier on this day!” she intoned, doing her best to keep her voice steady, “To remember the lives lost to the Golem King. To Rain-”
Wince. Twilight closed her eyes slowly. The Elements, not… she can’t name them. Not here. Not…
“To the Lost Elements. Who saved… who s-saved us all.”
Keep it together, Twilight.
Turning to Cadence, and ignoring her concerned look, Twilight took the torch in her teeth. She did not use magic for frivolous things, not anymore. She was more than an unicorn, than a Magic user. Jerking her head back rougher than she had planned, Twilight turned, jamming it into the brazier. She wasn’t quite sure why, but every… single second on that balcony was worrying at her nerves, and what control she had left. The second the flames rose enough to signal the polite clapping from below, Twilight sharply turned, all but storming off the balcony.
“Twilight…”
Not now, Celestia.
All Twilight wanted to do now was to go home, hug Spike, and get the literal buck out of this damn dress! It was the latest fashion in Canterlot: some nonsense about frills and rough stockings and GAH! Still walking down the hallway, Twilight allowed herself to light her horn, firmly tugging the damnable dress up and off her body, or at least trying to. She never had this much trouble with…
...with Rarity’s…
*************************
“Girls, get out of here, run!”
The light was blinding, the silhouette of its monstrous creator scarcely visible behind it, and the purple shield holding it back. Beneath it, Twilight Sparkle winced and cried out, cracks and golden blood streaming down her elegant horn. Her battle armor was long gone, blasted into dust; gashes in her side wept a horrible crimson, and blood streamed down her muzzle.
“We ain’t leavin’ you, Twilight!”
“Like buck we are!”
All around her stood her friends. Applejack, battered and bruised, still clad in the golden armor Celestia had given them all, stood to her left, glaring up at the monstrosity with righteous fury. Directly in front of Twilight stood Rainbow Dash; the pegasus had her wings spread wide, shielding her best friend in the only way she could. So many of her feathers had been ripped out in the fighting… To her right, Rarity stood tall, her own horn shattered, mane flat with golden blood and core. A horrific injury for any unicorn, possibly unrecoverable. But still she stood, still she defied the darkness, only sign of her pain being her clenched jaw.
Directly behind her, on either side, were Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy; Laughter, Kindness… Neither were suited for battle. But they would never, ever abandon their friends. Pinkie Pie was thin, one side of her body bruised in a way that, terrifyingly, reminded Twilight Sparkle of a rotten fruit. Despite favoring one leg, she leaned against Twilight, her head resting supportively against one side, while Fluttershy rested her’s on the other. The meek pegasus had shed her persona for her tough soul, the side she let few but her friends, and her most hated enemies, see. Her wings, as battered and bleeding as Rainbow’s, stretched tightly over Twilight’s own.
“P-please!” Twilight begged, eyes misting over in frustrated, helpless tears, “I can’t h-hold this much longer!”
As if to punctuate her statement, a deep crack spiderwebbed across the shield, growing ever larger every second. Rainbow’s maroon eyes peered back at Twilight, and she gave her the smallest of smiles, a missing tooth showing through.
“I can see the Princesses coming, Twilight…”
“Th-they won’t get here in time! You have-”
“We know.”
Too late, she saw Rainbow’s athletic, lightning fast body turning.
“Rainbow, don’t-!”
“They need YOU!”
With a scream, and all of her built up energies, Rainbow Dash hooked her wings against Twilight’s body… and cast her away. The crack of the sonic rainboom destroyed all noise, and Twilight watched in horror as the shield was obliterated, even as she was launched miles away. With her alicorn eyes, as enhanced as any hawks, the youngest alicorn stared into the kind eyes, and smiling faces of her friends, as the light enveloped them…
*************************
Tears streaming down her face, Twilight Sparkle turned away from the Residence Wing of the castle, and began to canter away. Through several side corridors, all but shoving her way through the guards posted there. They did not deserve that. Twilight knew that deep down. But at the moment, she could not force herself to care. She just… needed to see them. Just one more time. Just…
The door had been made with heavy marble and bright, colored steel; all of their cutie marks had been emblazoned on the mausoleum door. The protective wards were in place; nopony would be coming to disturb them unless Twilight allowed it. If she could not protect them in life… Ooh, bad thought. Tightness in her throat reared its ugly head in a heartbeat, and it was all Twilight could do to choke back a sob.
“I miss you all…”
Twilight knew exactly what they would tell her, seeing her emotional like this. Pinkie Pie would give her a hug and smile, and probably some kind of cupcake. Rainbow Dash would have grinned, zipping into a routine in the spacious castle room that would have left Twilight breathless. They always did. The first sob was soft, quiet; Twilight’s head bowed, and she slowly reached out for the mausoleum door. She could use a hug from Fluttershy so much right now...
The next sob was more of a wail, desperate and thin; the emotion roared into her spell-casting, turning a simple door-open cantrip into a beam of violet light that slammed into the mausoleum door. The entirety of the beautiful, ornate castle around Twilight Sparkle rumbled with her guilt, her shame. Beneath her silk-clad hooves, the marble cracked and rippled with Magic; the Magic that had failed her, once. Failed her, and too many others…
The doors roared as they were flung inward, but Twilight did not care. She did not care about the meetings she might interrupt, the nobles’ sleep she might disrupt. The books in the library that might be disturbed; all the thousands she had leafed through every day, every night. More rested in libraries across Equestria, across the Crystal Empire, Sandy Arabia, Stalliongrad… The entire world that Twilight Sparkle had travelled, desperate to find a way to end the curse that had stolen her life from her. Her friends. Perhaps, her loves.
Inside the mausoleum stood five statues; so life-like, despite their marble skin, their vacant eyes and gentle smiles. Their names inscribed beneath them, their cutie marks painted on their pedestals. Rainbow Dash. Captain of the Wonderbolts. Applejack. Head of the Apple Clan. Pinkie Pie. Owner of Laughter Emporium. Fluttershy. Head of all Equestria’s Animal Rescues and Hospitals. Rarity. Owner of the Carousel Boutiques.
Heroes of Equestria.
Burned to utter ash. Gone. Sacrificed so that Twilight Sparkle may live. To keep the Princess of Friendship alive, for the hope of a nation. Perhaps the hope of the world. Princess Luna, ever the artist, had interred the ashes of Twilight’s friends inside the marble statues, so that they would always be properly remembered. Outside the castle, at that very moment, nearly all of Equestria and the Crystal Empire was gathered. Gathered to commemorate the tenth anniversary of the Sacrifice of the Elements. All but one. One who now lay sobbing, wailing, at their hooves.
Twilight had not aged a day. She would not, for several thousand years hence. Immortality… the immortality that forced her to survive every day. That had made her survive that day, despite her injuries from the sonic rainboom. That had let her watch as Celestia, Luna, and Cadence managed to defeat what they could not. What… she, could not.
“I can’t do this,” she whimpered brokenly, reaching up to take her crown… and FLING it across the room with snarl, “I CAN’T!”
The young alicorn slammed her head into the ground, the dull ache in the back of her horn her penance.
“Not again… not another year…” she moaned out, slowly reaching out a hoof to caress Rainbow Dash’s pedestal, “I need y-you… I need you s-so much…”
Her body and head wracked with anguish as she sobbed on the floor… and a slowly building anger.
“Why?” she asked to the ceiling… then stomped down, hard, sending more cracks through the marble, “WHY?! Why them, and not me, huh?”
Gritting her teeth, Twilight cast aside any thought for herself, digging deep and seizing Magic with all of her might, dragging it up to the surface. Atop her forehead, her pike-like horn gleamed like the surface of the sun.
“WHY?! You gave me this power! You gave it to me, and to them! For us, to use it together!”
Another stomp, magic rippling out in arcane waves and washing over the statues.
“I can’t damn well use it without them! I don’t need it without them! I DON’T WANT IT, WITHOUT THEM!”
Twilight’s scream was loud, and long. Anger, guilt, hatred, boiling over and into her horn, and erupting into a gleaming point of blackest magic. In the back of her mind, Twilight knew that this had created so many of the beasts they faced together. Sombra… Discord, at first… Tirek… And she knew why. They had taken that blackness back into themselves.
Buck. That.
“I don’t want it, world!” Twilight snarled, choking back another sob, “SO TAKE IT BACK!”
Purple washed away the darkness in the ball, and magic erupted like a geyser from the alicorn. Eyes clenched tightly, Twilight could not know that her magic was washing over her friends, over the room, charging it all. That outside the castle, all the world could see the brilliant display, and marvelled.
It… hurt. It hurt so much… and so good. The magic that had been blessed to her, first in the Castle of the Pony Sisters, and again, by Celestia herself, began to quiver, and unspool from her soul. And Twilight did her best to shove it along; on her back, her unkempt wings began to flicker, and fade.
“Take it ALL back! I don’t want this! I don’t want to be a princess, I don’t want to be ANYTHING without them! JUST TAKE IT ALL BACK AND-”
“No, Twilight.”
Wings engulfed her on all sides; heat, love, and comfort, crashing through Twilight’s mental fugue. Celestia’s snoot was in her mane; Luna was pressed firmly into her back, and Cadence had molded to her side. All three of their horns gently slipped into the stream of raw Magic, and began to direct it. And even, to Twilight’s shock, began to add to it.
“W-what… what are you…”
“Shhh. Something is happening,” Luna whispered in reply, voice filled with wonder, and tinged with sorrow, “Magic is answering you.”
What…
*****************************
Outside, huddled in the gates, streets, courtyards and alleys of Canterlot, ponies of all tribes and ages gazed in awe at the swirling lights inside the Canterlot Mausoleum. None could turn their eyes away from the sight; harmonious magic, the magic of the world itself, shimmered and danced before their very eyes. Grasping at every pony in the city with a warm, amber magic, they all closed their eyes, rising slowly into the sky. Love and adoration for their home poured through; child-like, awe-filled, sorrow-tinged… so many emotions, so many different souls adding to the calling.
Nopony was certain who started the chant; but once they heard it, nopony could stop. A single note, lilting and carrying over the city, over the mountains and across the plains and forests, to distant Ponyville. Where something amazing happened. Though few in Canterlot could see it, the amber light washed over everypony in that little village, and added their voices to the chorus. And on to the next village… and the next town… and the next city…
All over the kingdom of Equestria, every pony, every species who followed the Elements, who adored Equestria and all it stood for, rose into the air, and began to sing. This was Magic. True Magic, in its rawest form. And, back in the mausoleum, Twilight began to understand, just a little, of her gifts.
The hold of the Princesses’ tightened, just momentarily, as they felt the magic and its song crescendo. Letting her tears dry away, Twilight opened her eyes, staring up at the stone faces of her friends… and added her voice to the song, those of her fellow Princesses mere milliseconds behind her.
Years later, ponies and creatures across the planet would claim they saw the rainbow-colored explosion that night, no matter how far away they were, or where they were at the time, outside or in. Something fundamental about the world had changed. Twilight saw that first hoof.
Lowered slowly to the ground, Twilight stared straight ahead, eyes wide and unblinking. She was small again, back to the same size she had started as an unicorn in Ponyville, so many years before. Her horn was back to its stubby little length… ...and her wings, still present, still unkempt. But it was not herself that Twilight was paying attention to. It was her friends.
Laying gently in a ponypile on the floor; sleeping, smiling… young again, looking like the young mares that Twilight had befriended, had even fallen in love with, though she had never told any of them. Uninjured from their final battle…
“My… f-friends…” Twilight whimpered, so quietly she barely heard it herself.
Her friends. Each and every one, a newly born alicorn. Dropping to her knees, Twilight managed, for the first time in ten years, a weak, tremulous smile… and dropped her head onto those of her friends, her loves, her life. Those she would never lose again.
