Author's Note

Fifteen minutes and thirty-eight seconds [15:38] into the season 5 finale, "The Cutie Re-Mark – Part 2," a serious misstep was made. A misstep that took what was on track to be the greatest finale in the series and turned it into a mediocre episode. We will now travel back in time to twenty seconds before the derailment and give the finale the ending it deserves.

Prologue

"The Cutie Re-Mark – Part 2"

[15:18]

The portal opened and once again deposited them in the past. And Twilight Sparkle, with Spike on her back, once again squared off against Starlight Glimmer. Showing Starlight the disastrous future that awaits if she continues to undo this historic event had failed. Reasoning had failed. They stood on a small cloud outside of Cloudsdale, and from behind Twilight, the pegasus race began again.

"You don't know what it's like to lose a friend because of a cutie mark. But once I stop the rainboom, you will! Starlight grinned as she spoke, and she teleported the backpack from Spike and drew from it the scroll containing Starswirl's spell: "And when I destroy this scroll, there'll be no way for you to change it!" Starlight held up the scroll with her magic and began to slowly tear it down the middle. Twilight looked on in horror.

[15:38]

The Cutie Redux

"No!" Twilight yelled and fired a magic bolt from her horn which struck the scroll and froze it in a pink crystal. Starlight's levitation spell on the scroll was broken, and the crystal fell through the cloud. Starlight looked up just in time to see Twilight, her face full of fury, charging towards her in flight. With only an instant to spare, Starlight teleported herself up a short distance. And Twilight plowed through the empty space below. Starlight turned her head towards the race and Rainbow Dash, but before she could cast a spell to interfere, she felt herself grabbed by a magical forcefield. Twilight yanked the pink unicorn down and out of sight of Rainbow Dash and the bullies. Then Twilight charged towards the ground, pulling Starlight along, Spike struggling to hold on to her tail.

"Ugg!" Starlight groaned and kicked her legs, as though trying to run or climb through the air. Her horn glowed with teal-colored magic, and she broke free of Twilight's grasp. Without a moment's hesitation, Twilight teleported herself and Spike to a height just above Starlight. With all momentum retained, Twilight collided with Starlight, wrapped her forelegs around her, and continued the earthward dive.

Dizzy and disoriented, Spike let out a weak cry, "Ahh," before losing his hold of Twilight's tail in the mid-air collision. He fell through the air alongside the ponies and flailed his little limbs about before receiving a kick to the face from one of Starlight's hindlegs. Recovering, Spike grabbed the leg and held on to it for dear life.

The ground drew nearer, and Twilight could see a group of animals gathered in a clearing below. The animals surrounded a small yellow figure which Twilight thought must be Fluttershy. With a jerk, Twilight adjusted their course and steered the three to land a little farther north. Struggling, Starlight charged up her horn and pressed it into Twilight's shoulder, shocking her with an audible zap, and allowing herself to wiggle free. Supported by her own magic, Starlight kicked her hindleg, trying to shake Spike off: "Agg! Get off!" Starlight glared down at Spike, baring teeth, anger in her eyes, horn glowing.

Still hugging Starlight's leg, Spike looked up at her with his baby face and big round eyes. "Hehe," he giggled nervously. Then, he let go and allowed himself to fall: "Twilight!"

Twilight swooped in, catching Spike a short distance above the ground, then tossed him into the dirt and flew towards Starlight. "You robbed ponies of their identities!" Twilight yelled as she fired a magic bolt, "You robbed ponies of their purpose!" She fired again. Her eyes began to glow neon white as she spoke: "And now you're robbing them of their future! I will do anything to stop you!"

Starlight fired a beam of magic at Twilight, who raised a frontal shield, dispelling it. Starlight fired again but was again denied a direct hit. Twilight flapped her wings hard and closed the gap rapidly. Starlight knew she could not match Twilight's speed in flight. And, seeing her determination and frightfully glowing eyes, she knew that this was different from their earlier duel. She knew she was not equal to the alicorn in direct, unrestrained, combat. Starlight turned her eyes upward and saw Rainbow Dash. "The race!" she gasped. The race was nearly finished. Rainbow Dash was gaining speed in a downward dive. In each of the times Starlight had tampered with the past, she had never let the race run this far. She knew that the rainboom was imminent.

Twilight, coming from Starlight's left and from slightly below, charged up her horn for her final attack. The magical energy surrounding Twilight's horn was a sparkling platinum as opposed to her usual magenta. As Twilight conjured the spell, the voice of a distant memory came floating into her mind: "Twilight Sparkle, you have a very special gift. I don't think I've ever come across a unicorn with your raw abilities," the first words Celestia ever spoke to her. Words spoken on the day Twilight first felt a glimpse of this power she held within her, the day she got her cutie mark – this day.

Starlight charged her horn and took aim at Rainbow Dash. Twilight fired. The platinum beam struck Starlight just as she was releasing her energy on Rainbow Dash, but her spell never made it past the end of her horn.

"Ahh, ahh!" Starlight cried as she felt the unfamiliar magic surround her body. She could not break free. She could not teleport. She looked at the incoming Rainbow Dash, but despite every ounce of physical and magical strength, she could not cast any spell. Colorful ribbons of blue and yellow and red traveled up the beam from Twilight to Starlight and began to slowly push the pink unicorn farther into the air. "No!" Starlight screamed, though she did not know if her mouth had actually moved, and she tried once more to strike at Rainbow Dash. Twilight clenched her teeth and pushed her head forward. With a jolt, the energy beam carried Starlight into the sky at immense speed. Before things went dark and Starlight lost sight of what was below her, she saw from the small blue figure of the speeding pegasus erupt the dazzling, rippling, shockwave of a sonic rainboom. And a muted scream flooded her mind.

From the ground, Spike bore witness to the events. The shockwave from the rainboom merged with the multi-colored beam from Twilight's spell, and the two became indistinguishable to anyone outside of a narrow range from where he stood. Spike watched with mouth agape as the image of Starlight grew smaller and more distant. When she was nothing more than a little spot of light in the sky, Starlight glimmered, and the light broke into four points – similar to the four light points around the center of her cutie mark – and formed stars which twinkled faintly in the daylight before fading from view. Rainbow Dash soared up, and up, towards, then over, Cloudsdale, before arcing back down again, all with a stunningly clear rainbow in her wake. Twilight, however, was nowhere to be seen. When Twilight cast her spell, and Starlight was no longer in sight, she was engulfed in an orb of white light, which vanished in a matter of seconds, taking the princess with it.

For Twilight, the world had gone white. Then she found herself standing in an ethereal sky – stars above, stars below. She did not flap her wings, and she did not have to. Twilight knew this place, for she had been here before, on the night she earned her wings and became a princess. And as before, a familiar figure appeared and began moving towards her. "Celestia!" Twilight cried in delight.

"Who are you, Princess?" Celestia spoke in a strong, but not harsh, regal voice. "And why have you unleashed such a powerful banishment spell on a fellow pony?" Celestia stood before Twilight and looked down at her.

"Celestia… Princess, my name is Twilight Sparkle. I pursued the other pony here from the future. She travelled back to this time to stop the rainboom from occurring. An event which is critical to the wellbeing of Equestria. I know this all sounds fantastic, but please, Celestia, believe me. In this time, I am just a filly, I'm right now taking the entrance exam at your school for gifted unicorns, and if all has been set right, I'll be getting my cutie mark. But in time I will become your student, and you, my mentor."

Celestia stood silent, listening to Twilight, studying her.

"There are five other ponies who get their cutie marks from this same rainboom," Twilight continued, "and a bond of friendship will form between myself and them. A bond that will enable us to wield the Elements of Harmany and defend Equestria. And even to restore Luna when Nightmare Moon returns."

"Luna?!" Celestia said. "Impossible. The bind holding Nightmare Moon was meant to be permanent."

"But the prophecy came true!" said Twilight.

"Prophecy?! What prophecy?"

Twilight looked at Celestia with some surprise – how could Celestia not know of such an important, and personally significant, prophecy? "The one from the book Predictions and Prophecies," answered Twilight. "Where it says, "On the longest day of the thousandth year, the stars will aid in her escape."

"I know every book ever written on Nightmare Moon," Celestia replied. "And there is no such mention of her in that one!"

Confused, Twilight responded, "But there is! I remember it clearly. And I saw it happen! On the night Nightmare Moon escaped, I saw starlight converge on the moon and… starlight. Starlight!" Twilight gasped and her eyes went wide, and she did a little nervous prance where she stood. Then she looked up at Celestia: "The pony I banished, a powerful unicorn, was named Starlight Glimmer. Her mark was set in the space beyond the sky in the form of four stars when I cast my spell on her. I think those were the stars I saw that night! Is it possible, Celestia? Could I have created the prophecy?!"

Celestia held her gaze on Twilight for a moment, then slowly walked around her and further into the sky. Twilight followed. "When I banished my sister, Luna, I thought that the bind to hold her in the moon would be everlasting," Celestia said. I never considered the effect a second binding spell would have if cast to a nearby region. It is possible," Celestia went on after a pause, "that the two binds would gradually weaken each other until the more powerful of the banished manages to escape… Luna."

"But once that happens, then the bind holding Starlight will no longer weaken and it will hold her forever, right?" Asked Twilight.

"I see now that it is unwise to speak in terms of 'forever,' but yes, her bind should hold."

Twilight turned her head down and frowned. "Oh, Celestia," she eventually said, "I feel just horrible. I never wanted to do something like this to another pony. I never even knew that I could. And to a pony who, in some ways, was just like me." Celestia came to a stop, and so did Twilight. "I tried to find some other way to fix the damage she was causing. I tried to reason with her, I tried to show her another way. But I couldn't… I couldn't get her to see. And I had to save them, my friends… and everypony… I saw what would happen if I didn't." Twilight sprung up and wrapped her forelegs around Celestia and spoke with tears in her eyes: "I didn't know I could do a thing like this, and I didn't want to. But I couldn't find another way. I had to do it! In my time, they call me the Princess of Friendship; and today, I failed in that."

Celestia looked warmly at Twilight and put her wing around her. Twilight stepped back down. "I know what you are feeling right now, Princess Twilight," Celestia said gently. For I once too had to carry out an act, a dreadful act, to defend our dear land and the ponies within it. It is our duty as princesses. You did not fail. And if all that you say about the future is true, then I would never be more proud than to have you as my student." Twilight looked up at Celestia and smiled as she wiped the tears from her eyes.

"Now," Celestia said, "you should return to your own time." Twilight nodded in agreement. "Time does not act the same in this realm," Celestia continued. "When you leave here, only seconds will have past from where you were before."

"I understand," said Twilight.

"Come and see me when you get back," Celestia said as she began to walk away. "We will have much to talk about. But right now, there is a young filly in Canterlot who I am very eager to meet."

Spike stood alone on the grass, silence all around him, now that the rainboom was through. "Twilight?" he said, speaking softly and feeling very small. Then above him the orb reappeared and began descending to the ground. "Twilight!" he said louder and ran on his short stubby legs to meet her. The orb landed and the light dispersed. "Twilight! Are you okay? Is it over?"

Twilight looked down at the little dragon: "Yes, Spike. It's over. Everything is going to be alright now."

Spike looked up at her and smiled before leaning in and hugging her foreleg.

"Come on," Twilight said crouching so that Spike could climb onto her back," let's go home."

"Right!" Spike said climbing on, "but do we need to find the scroll? I think it went down over there." He pointed towards a cluster of trees not far from them.

"I'm already on it," Twilight said. A magenta aura surrounded her horn, and she took off.

Twilight flew quickly and close to the ground, her magic guiding her not to the scroll, but to the crystallization spell that she had cast on it to protect it. In a moment she found it lying where it had fallen. At the same time Spike called out, "Hey, it's my backpack." He hopped off Twilight's back and ran to retrieve it: "Can't leave this behind!" Once he was proudly reunited with his pack, Spike ran back over to the princess.

Twilight levitated the encased scroll to her and shattered the protective crystal, the shards evaporating into nothing. She held the scroll with her magic, the artifact from another time, and as she did, the portal appeared above them, and they rose through the event horizon. The portal closed, the past secured.

In Canterlot, Celestia entered her school for gifted unicorns. The exam room was abuzz with activity. The four unicorn examiners were levitating above their chairs, caught in a magical forcefield. On the other side of the room was an out of place cactus and potted plant, which just a moment ago had been two adult ponies. And then there was the newly hatched baby dragon, who stood so tall, and whose neck was so long, that its head broke through the roof and was visible to shocked onlookers passing by on the streets. And at the center of it all, floating in a sparkling aura of magic, and with neon white glowing eyes, was a little purple unicorn who had just gotten her cutie mark.

Celestia put her arm on the filly's back to calm her down from her excited state. The filly's eyes returned to normal, the auras dissipated, the examiners dropped, the mare and stallion were restored from their leafy and prickly forms, and the baby dragon reverted back to hatchling size. "Twilight Sparkle, you have a very special gift. I don't think I've ever come across a unicorn with your raw abilities," Celestia said. "But you need to learn to tame these abilities through focused study. Twilight Sparkle, I'd like to make you my own personal protégé here at the school."

Days later, Twilight sat reading on the grass of the courtyard outside of the school. Three other little unicorns – one yellow with the cutie mark of three hearts, one ivory with the cutie mark of three stars, and one sky-blue with the cutie mark of an hourglass – pranced and hopped about trying to get her to come play.

Celestia meanwhile, watched from the window of the old research tower. She had on the stand before her the book Predictions and Prophecies. Celestia used her magic to seamlessly place an additional page in the text. She watched Twilight, diligent in her studies but unmindful of companionship, as she added to the page, "On the longest day of the thousandth year, the stars will aid in her escape…" Then Celestia placed the book high on the bookshelf and left the tower which was to be converted into the lodging for her most promising student.