Twilight turned and looked at Maddock's dead body with her mouth agape. She couldn't believe it. One of her best friends had been taken from her in the blink of an eye. She shook a bit as emotions finally managed to find their way back into her system. She turned and gave Sapphira a lethal look. Now the fire that had been in Sapphira's eyes transfused itself into Twilight's.

"You…MONSTER!" Twilight shrieked as she leapt at Sapphira. The evil unicorn didn't see it coming and lost her footing. She fell underneath Twilight, but managed to block a death strike with her horn. "You'll never kill me!" She yelled. "Oh, yes, I will!" Twilight screamed, "YOU TOOK MY FRIEND FROM ME!"

"The moron jumped in front of my horn!"

"I don't care!" Twilight said as the tears rolled down her face, "I don't care! You took him! YOU TOOK HIM!" She began slashing with her horn as she screamed, leaving gaping holes in Sapphira's flesh. Sapphira howled with each slash, but then she began slashing back. Blood flowed from each pony as they took out their emotions on each other, Twilight for the good of the ponies of Equestria, and Sapphira for the good of herself. They both knew that one miscue could be the difference between life and death.

That miscue came courtesy of Sapphira, who became too confident in her slashing maneuvers and misjudged the distance between herself and Twilight. That allowed the princess to get underneath her and rip her skin open from her hind legs to her forelegs. Sapphira convulsed as she began coughing up blood. She collapsed and within seconds was dead.

Twilight stepped back and looked down upon her foe. "Hail Equestria, and all the ponies in it," she said simply, "ponies like you have no place here. Your evil shall be recorded for all ponies to read for all time, and they shall learn from your mistakes."

She backed up and wobbled a bit. Applejack raced forward and steadied her. "It's alright, sugar cube," she said softly, "I've got ya." Twilight turned and gave a look that betrayed the immense pain coursing through her body. Then her face froze with realization. "Maddock!" She suddenly cried and ran to her dead friend's corpse.

She looked down at it with a devastated look and began weeping. "Oh, Maddock," she said between sobs, "…you were the best of us. You showed today what true friendship is. You gave yourself for me." She sniffed as the rest of her friends gathered around and mourned their loss. Fluttershy, Pinkie Pie, and Rarity cried right out loud. Rainbow Dash stood at attention and offered the Wonderbolts salute to their fallen brother. Applejack and Starlight tried to hide their tears, but to no avail. But out of all of them, Twilight's was the most devastating response. Her tears flowed like a river, and she buried herself in Maddock's shoulder. "Maddock…" She barely choked out.

Suddenly, the bubble behind them burst as Celestia was able to work up enough magic to free herself. She looked around what once was her bedroom, now stained with the blood of three ponies. She shook her head sadly and stepped forward to where Twilight and her friends were. Nothing like this had ever happened in the thousands of years that she and Luna had ruled Equestria, and to be frank, she didn't know how to respond.

Ponies died all the time, sure, but it wasn't at the hooves of other ponies. Still, Celestia looked upon Maddock's body with a hint of pride. He had accomplished something that she wanted him to without even being told to accomplish it. He had resurrected the long lost seventh element of friendship. He embodied sacrifice. Now it fell to her to tell Twilight and her friends about this.

"Twilight," Celestia said softly. Twilight turned and saw Celestia's kind, understanding face. She gave her a look of complete helplessness and buried her face in her chest. Celestia rubbed Twilight's mane, trying to comfort her bewildered and shattered former student. In that moment, Celestia was taken back to the days when Twilight was a filly and she would stub her toe or fail an assignment or be disappointed or hurt in some other way and she would come to her for advice and encouragement.

"He's gone," Twilight choked out, "my best friend is gone."

"I know, Twilight," Celestia soothed, "I know. But in so doing, he proved his friendship to you."

"But why, Celestia?" Twilight sobbed, "why did it have to be like this?"

"I will never understand fate, my dear friend," Celestia said, "but what I do understand is that Maddock's heart lay in the right place, and he had you and your friends to thank for it. But what he did here today was so much more than just proving a friendship."

Twilight sniffled and looked up at Celestia. Celestia returned the look and saw, not the proud, strong, determined, beautiful princess she had come to know, but the curious and intelligent student that she had loved for so many years. She knew Twilight like a book and when she gave that curious look, Celestia always automatically launched into an explanation of some sort.

But now she found that her commands to her brain were being disobeyed quite frequently. She couldn't say anything. How could she explain the concept of the seventh element of harmony and friendship to somepony who had just lost someone so dear to them? She knew that she had to. She owed Twilight an explanation for what she had said.

So she shrugged off her doubt and summoned her words with care. "Twilight, when I first met Maddock, he was a bigoted, racist pony. Yet I also saw in him a desire to make and keep friends. I also knew about…the seventh element of harmony." Twilight gasped in shock. A seventh element? But…whatever could it be, and what does Maddock have to do with it?

Celestia gently removed Twilight from her shoulder and walked over to look at the fallen pony. "When Star Swirl first discovered the Tree of Harmony, there were seven elements on it. Unfortunately, before he had the chance to properly study all of them, one was cut away from the tree and stolen. Though he never caught the culprit, Star Swirl always believed that the magic of the tree would find somepony who represented that seventh element someday, and he tasked me with helping in that search as much as I could.

As I said before, when I met Maddock, I could see that he was a lonely, frustrated pony. Even though he didn't want to admit it, he was tired of being a hateful creature. I could tell, deep within him, he wanted to make connections with others, but he wasn't sure how to go about doing that. He put up a gruff and mean exterior, but inside beat the heart of a true friend. His eyes, and his actions constantly betrayed that.

Even though he was a racist, bigoted, mean spirited pony to his fellow adults, he would constantly stop and help the young foals of Canterlot when they needed it. He wouldn't leave any young pony behind, even the unicorns." This elicited a shocked reaction from the others before she continued. "Yes, even the unicorns. He couldn't bear to see a foal be left in the cold or without something to eat. I constantly watched him sacrifice his warmth and food to see that a young colt or filly was fed or sheltered for the night. Believe it or not, the foals of Canterlot thought of him as their friend, even though he never did.

I knew he could change his bigotry if only he were given the chance. So I gave him one and sent him to you, Twilight, in the hopes that, if he were to truly change and let friendship in, he might embody the seventh element of harmony. I can see by his actions tonight that I was right."

She turned to look at the ponies, who were broken up not only because of the death of their friend, but because of the sweetness of Celestia's story. She took a small breath and continued. "When he sacrificed his life to save you, Twilight, I knew we had found our seventh element of harmony. The one that would join you six in keeping the magic of friendship alive throughout Equestria. Unfortunately, the seventh element is the most painful one. It's the element…of sacrifice."

Twilight looked at her beloved former mentor with disbelief. "So…what you're saying is that Maddock…was the embodiment of an element of harmony?" Celestia nodded. "He most certainly was."

Twilight's lip quivered as she moved back to Maddock's body. She could do nothing but bury her head in his shoulder and cry all over again. He was the element of sacrifice, and fate had declared that his job was to be killed instead of her. "Why?" She sobbed, "why couldn't it have been me? Why couldn't Sapphira have just finished me off instead?"

Celestia moved forward. "Twilight, you mustn't say things like that," she said quietly, "Maddock was a great friend to all of you. Don't let his memory be a constant questioning of what might have happened. Let his memory be a celebration of the wonderful time you had together. Trust me, when you've lived as long as I have, you'll learn to remember your friends as they were meant to be remembered, not as what you think they should be remembered as."

Twilight sniffed a bit and sat up. Her friends gathered around her, with Applejack and Pinkie Pie putting comforting hooves on her shoulders. She could do nothing but just sit and cry and mourn with her friends. By this point, even Celestia was shedding a few tears. Twilight was not only sad, but also scared to death of what had just happened. She had never dealt with death before. Now that she was an Alicorn and she knew she would live for thousands of years, would this be her fate every time somepony she loved died? Wait…loved? She thought, did I…love him?

She came to the sudden realization that she had loved him all this time. She thought herself too busy and too royal for romance. She thought of it as being for younger ponies and wide eyed mares with dreams of being queens of their own little domestic kingdoms one day. But then she realized that it wasn't just for them. It was for her as well. Unfortunately, this internal revelation caused her to cry all the more. Now he'll never know it! She yelled in her mind.

Then, she opened her eyes and stepped away from the group. She bent down to Maddock's ear and whispered, "I know you can't hear me. But I need to tell you this. I love you, Maddock, just as you have loved me. Nothing will ever take that away from me. My love for you is eternal."

When she said that, a sudden burst of light emanated from back towards Ponyville. Suddenly, a fierce magic came pouring into the room and flooded throughout Maddock's body. The other ponies all gasped and retreated a bit, unsure of what was happening. As they watched in amazement, Maddock's body was lifted off the ground and spread out. The magic weaved its way through him until it was through, and then set him down and quickly left the room.

Suddenly, Maddock groaned and opened his eyes. He looked up at his friends, who were all giving him very shocked, yet joyous looks, with ten-foot-wide grins plastered over their faces. "Um…did we win?" He asked. He never received an answer, because Twilight tackled him. "MADDOCK!" She yelled in pure joy, "oh, Maddock!" She kept repeating his name over and over and over again as she hugged him tightly.

"Twi…Twi…your hugs are awesome, but I can't breathe!"

"Oh! Sorry…" She said sheepishly, letting him go. Suddenly, he was surrounded by his friends, who were all talking over one another. "Guys? Guys? GUYS?!" He shouted, trying to get himself heard. "One at a time, please!" So, carefully, they told him about what had happened, about how he embodied the seventh element of harmony, and about how he had been dead.

"But…how was I raised back to life?"

Celestia stepped forward with a big smile. "I think I have the answer. The Tree of Harmony couldn't bear for you to die this way, without having the full experience of what true friendship has to offer, so it sent some magic here and the rest, as they say, is history."

Maddock couldn't believe his ears. He had been dead…and now he was alive again? He didn't have time to ponder this as he found himself wrapped up in another one of Twilight's hugs. This one was lighter and he gladly returned it. "Twilight, I…" He tried to say, but couldn't, for he found himself in a deep kiss, courtesy of the princess. The other ponies didn't say anything, but looked on and smiled as Twilight poured all her love into the gesture.

Maddock couldn't believe this was happening, but was happier than he had ever been in his life. He gladly kissed her back. They started going a little long, but were quickly stopped by a rather strong throat clearing from Celestia. They backed away from each other and Twilight giggled a bit. They hugged once again before standing up.

The ponies all moved to the window and looked down upon the plazas of Canterlot. They could see Shining Armor and the Canterlot forces driving away the last remaining strands of the bigoted army. "Once again, Equestria is safe for ponies of all kinds," Celestia said triumphantly, "and, if I'm not mistaken, we have a royal wedding to prepare for."