//------------------------------//
// The Prophecy 
// Story: The Fifth Great Alicorn 
// by TwilightSparkleForever 
//------------------------------//

"Princess Luna." 

The regal blue mare, her mane shining like a mass of stars, turned around to face her tall white sister.

"It has come to my attention that ever since I have made my most prized pupil, Twilight Sparkle, into a princess, the stars are shifting farther away from their rightful places each night. Would you happen to know why?" 

"I have seen this, too, but I do not know what it means, although i do know that it is disrupting my raising of the moon each night. The stars seem to block my magic from raising the moon. Every night, my magic gets weaker trying to raise it." 

Celestia took a quick glace at the stars shining above. "I can help you with that, but recently I have remembered something I read a long time ago in Canterlot's official archives. It is about the five alicorns prophesied to be created. As I recall, Star Swirl the Bearded uncovered an ancient relic that prophesied the coming of these five alicorns. He decoded it, and found that it was a prophecy telling of the coming of five alicorns. We are the first two alicorns, then Cadence from the Crystal Empire, then Twilight, who I recently made. But the fifth alicorn has not been found yet. And I recall something else about the stars aligning at a certain position, one that has never been seen before. Luna-do you know what this means?" 

"Yes...The stars are forming a shape to signal the coming of the fifth alicorn!" 

"You cannot be more correct, my sister." 

"Hey, Celestia...how about we do some reading in our bedroom? Like old times?" 

"Yeah. And I know just what we should read..." 





The two sisters walked down the brightly lit corridor to the Canterlot Archives ahead. 

As they met the locked door leading to the archives, Celestia swiftly slided her horn into the round lock, opening it with a loud click. 

Soon, the two sisters had scoured the entire room with a complicated searching spell, and unrolled the scroll they were looking for. "This is definitely it," said Celestia, enveloping it in a golden glow, of a color similar to that of her shining golden armor. 

The two sisters headed back, Celestia levitating the the scroll open in the air while Luna read out loud. 

"But before Star Swirl was able to finish decoding the entire relic, he died-whoa. It has an actual photo of the relic here." 

"Wait, that part-about him dying before he finished decoding it? That's so weird...I never heard of that before." 

"I know-they didn't read that to us when we were little. But-oh my gosh! The photo's taped onto the scroll with aincent alicorn tape!" 

Celestia fixed her eyes on the scroll, wondering if Luna had left out anything or had read it wrong. "That didn't happen!" said Celestia. "He decoded the whole relic! It's not like the Canterlot ponies of the castle say. It's not the story we hear all the time." 

"It's not the story we were raised to believe in," said Luna. "If that's what you mean, you are completely correct." 
"No, no, no! That means.the story everypony has told us is a lie." 
"Celestia, we have to decode the rest of the relic!" 

Celestia made a face. "Decode the rest of the relic? No way!"

"But it's written in Old Pony, you can read most of that, right?" 

"No. That isn't Old Pony..it's an even older version of the pony language, using symbols for each word!" 

"Hey, I think i know what each symbol means...The creepy red eye means evil, the horn and wing mean alicorn, and the bottle of liquid...I don't know. But I think I can decode it with your help." 

Celestia frowned. "Yeah, fine." 





Back in the two sisters' bedroom, the twosome of mares sat down, comfortably pushing themselves into the tangled blankets of Celestia's bed. "Now, where to start?" Luna questioned. "At the top," said the white mare, her horn glowing and gently sliding off her princess armor. "Two sisters, night and day. One Alicorn to represent the Crystal Kingdom. An Alicorn not born, but one made. And one to be a mystery. That's the part we know, right? So, I think it ends here, because the magnifying glass looks like 'mystery.' " The regal princess of the sun jabbed at a carving of a magnifying glass on the photo of the relic. 

Luna took the scroll, enveloping it in a sparkling dark blue aura, similar to that of the night sky. "I think I know this whole sentence," she said confidently, holding it up close to herself. "The stars will align, like never seen before, That will signal the coming of the evil fifth alicorn." 
The two sisters looked at each other. "Evil?" Celestia managed to murmur, putting her hoof to her head. 
"Let's decode the next sentence," said Luna excitedly, but a bit scared and nervous at the same time. 
Celestia took the scroll in her gold magical aura and read the next sentence. "One more Alicorn, made by herself. Changed by hatred, and her own flank, that was blank." 

"So...the fifth alicorn was changed by hatred, and she had a blank flank," said Luna. "That means she's probably a foal." Celestia made a face. "I don't think a foal can change herself. She or he wouldn't even be able to crate a tiny spark using her or his own horn." 

"So...you are suggesting that this pony might be an adult? Because that's entirely impossible, unless a spell was cast on her. And that way, the spell would have to be renewed every day, or she would be able to have a cutie mark.." 

"The next sentence is in another language," said Luna. "And I don't know it." 
"Oh, no," said Celestia. "This has to be another language I don't know." 

"Hey, you know how we just decoded that part?" said Luna. I think that was perhaps our destiny..but it is not our destiny to read the next part. Perhaps somepony else should read it.." 
"Let's write down what we decoded on the scroll," said Celestia. "Great idea," said Luna. 

Princess Celestia magically levitated the best of her quills from her quill box, immediately scribbling down what they had decoded. She ended with who they were and how they had decoded it. 





Meanwhile, below the stars, in the busy city of Manehattan, stood a pony. An unicorn. 

Her name was Raspberry Dapple, and she sat, lonely, on the street, shunned by all ponies who passed by. She knew nothing of friendship, nothing of happiness, and even nothing of the joy of recieving your cutie mark. She knew not of the warm glow that filled your flank as you fulfilled your destiny. She had no idea of what it was like to be like the other inhabitants of Manehattan. Her jealousy bubbled up in her heart every single day, watching the happy ponies pass by with young fillies and colts. As they walked past her, she felt the sting of jealousy rush through her body with growing pain, not physical, but mental. 

She sat, shrouded in the loneliness of her life, ponies staring at her as they walked by. The moonlight cast her long shadow onto the tall building behind her. 

And she swore she would get her cutie mark, one way or the other. Other ponies stared at her, and she would stare right back in hatred, longing for revenge on those who laughed at her. 

She went back to her tiny home for the day, pulling out her day's findings and scattering them on the table. She saw nothing of value but a few coins. Enough to buy her dinner for tommorow. She piled the rest into the bin, sighing as she walked into her lab. She decided to stay there for the rest of the day. Her potion was almost working out; she could feel it. She just had to add the very last ingredient. The one that would change her, when she drunk it, into one of the most powerful beings of Equestria, and undoubtedly gain her her very own cutie mark. 

She had been hurt a thousand times, but she would hurt those who had hurt her a million times. 





Celestia sensed the stars aligning, and Luna sensed it even more. 
"The stars-" said Luna. 
"I know," said Celestia, the two sisters looking out the window into the stars of the night. 

"The fifth alicorn is coming. And we're not ready yet."