Twilight blearily opened her eyes to find herself sprawled out over the floor. Looking around, she saw her friends awakening in the same fashion.
"Oi, feels like I dipped a little heavily in Berry Punch's secret stash," Lyra moaned.
"Ooh! Ooh! Look what you're wearing!" Minuette yelped.
Everypony looked to their necks, and saw where the fragments of Elements of Harmony had coalesced hung golden necklaces with a large gleaming gem embedded in the chest piece. A trio of yellow hearts, a blue hourglass, three orange stars, a green lyre, and a red crescent moon.
"Cool! They match our cutie marks!" Lemon Hearts exclaimed, tapping hers.
"Hey! Why does Twilight get the fancy tiara?" Twinkleshine pointed out.
Twilight looked to her head, and found that her friend was right. Instead of a necklace for her, there was a jeweled tiara on top of her head, sporting the magenta six pointed star of her cutie mark.
"What does it mean?" Lemon Hearts asked.
"The Elements of Harmony were originally wielded by the two royal pony sisters," Moondancer theorized. "Perhaps this is their way of signifying they've accepted us as their new bearers."
"You are correct, my little pony."
Everypony turned and gasped as a rich, golden light started to fill the room from the windows.
The sun was rising. And from the newfound morning, another ball of light descended from the sun. It slowly grew as it stopped inches from the floor until it dispersed in an intense radiance, leaving behind the form of a tall, regal alicorn in all her splendor, head held high with a smile and wings outstretched to their full length.
Everypony bowed to the royal pony, everypony except Twilight, who showed her reverence in a more endearing way.
"Princess Celestia!"
She ran straight up to her ruler and mentor, whereas Princess Celestia answered in kind by lowering her neck to warmly nuzzle her student.
"Twilight Sparkle, my faithful student. I knew you could do it."
Twilight looked quizzically at Celestia as their embrace ended. "But...you told me it was all an old pony tale."
"I told you that you needed to make some friends, nothing more," she explained. "I saw the signs of Nightmare Moon's return, but I knew if I confronted her again as I did 1000 years ago, history would merely repeat itself...or worse. I wanted to save my sister this time, not defeat her. If I was to do that however, I needed to entrust that task to somepony other than myself. It's why I did not resist when she imprisoned me in my own sun. There was, after all, no better place to refrain from unnecessary action but still listen and watch her movements than from within a cell of her own magical design.
"You had the potential to unlock the power of the Elements of Harmony as I once did, but you could not unleash it until you let true friendship into your heart. That's why I sent you to Ponyville in the first place, Twilight. As the friendliest town I've known for years in all of Equestria, I was sure you would be able to find the friends you needed there."
Twilight smiled back at her teacher knowingly. "But that's just it, your highness. I didn't need to go to Ponyville to find friends." She looked back at the unicorns who were lifting their heads up and now smiling back at her. "I already had friends in Canterlot. Friends that have stood by me and shared experiences with since I started coming to your school, and I have just learned I am so very lucky to have after all this time."
Celestia beamed. "So I see. Perhaps you knew more about friendship than I was led on to believe. Nevertheless, I'm proud to see that your actions this day have touched the hearts of so many. Now if only it will reach one more..."
She slowly crossed the hall, pass all the unicorns, to a darkened corner of the room. Laying there, and opening her eyes with a start, was a smaller indigo alicorn among the discarded jet black regalia littered about.
"Princess Luna."
"Not...Nightmare Moon?" Minuette asked out loud.
"That was merely a title she took when she allowed her dark thoughts to consume herself," Celestia replied almost automatically, never taking her eyes off the other alicorn. "But to me, she has, and always will be my dear sister Luna."
Luna seemed to cringe and cower as Celestia now stood directly above her.
"It has been a thousand years since I have seen you like this. More than long enough for me find the exact words I need to say to you."
She knelt down to her level, much to everypony's surprise, with a softened expression.
"I never meant to put my obligations before your love. But intentional or not, I did take our relationship for granted, always believing it would be there no matter what happened. And as a result, I lost it...by willful neglect. You're not faultless in the matter Luna, as you let the darkness take hold in your heart by choice. But I am just as much to blame, as I allowed it the opportunity to do so. And for a millennium, I have stood, virtually alone, never one day passing where I thought about what I had, and how I lost it."
She stood up once more, an inviting hoof held out. "Now, what I want more than anything, is another chance. I want for us to rule together again, as we both swore we would do. Can you forgive me, as I have you, and be my friend once more?"
Every other pony leaned forward in anticipation, as Luna seemed hesitant to answer. But when she did, she did more than just take Celestia's hoof, she took her entire body.
"I'm so sorry!" She squeezed the other alicorn tightly. "I never meant for this either! I do forgive you, and I missed you so much, big sister!"
Tears misted over them both as Celestia closed her wings around her sister. "I've missed you, too," was all she said. It was all that was needed to be said.
A clacking of steps signaled the approach of someone, and just then Nectar emerged from the spiral stairway leading into the room.
"There you all are! For a few minutes I was-OH SWEET ALL-MOTHER OF THE SWARM IT'S THE PRINCESS!!!"
Her backpedaling resulted in tripping over a fallen pillar and landing on her wings before Lemon Hearts rushed over and helped her up.
"Easy! Easy!" She did her best to quell the flailing of her friend's legs and flashing of disguises. "She's nice. Really friendly. She won't hurt you, promise!"
The now polka-dotted burnt-sienna pegasus stallion in her hold peaked over her shoulder timidly. "Really?"
Celestia broke out of the embrace and approached, a look of genuine curiosity on her face. "Well now, who do we have here?"
"Oh, yeah!" Lemon Hearts set all four hooves down and stood at attention next to her friend. "Princess Celestia. This is Nectar, Ponyville's resident changeling. She sorta knew her way around this forest and helped us get here in the first place." She shifted a hoof slightly between them. "You will be nice to her, right?"
Celestia's bemusement slowly dissolved to amusement. "Well now," she said, looking down to pony figure in the mix-matched color palette, "why don't you come a little closer so I can get a better look at your face?"
Nectar looked at Lemon Hearts, who nodded. So, with a few tentative steps, she met the solar alicorn at face point.
Celestia grinned. "And your other one..."
Nectar blinked, but then realized what was implied. Green flames washed over her as she dropped her makeshift guise.
Celestia continued to smile as she looked her over. "I've never actually seen one of your species this close up before. I can't help but notice what beautiful blue eyes your kind have. It's a wonder why you ever want to hide those, and I'm sure the ponies of Ponyville would agree once we get back to them."
Nectar's gossamer wings gave a buzzing twitch of hope. "Does...that mean you're letting me go? You're not going to exterminate me?"
Celestia lightly chuckled. "I'll certainly do more than that my little po- er...changeling. After all, what kind of ruler would I be if I didn't reward a national hero?"
She turned to the others. "In fact, you all should be rewarded. This calls for a celebration, posthaste!"
"Ooh! Ooh! Can I make a suggestion then?" Minuette blurted, waving her hoof frantically.
"Yes?" Celestia asked.
"Would you two like to come to Moondancer's party?"
Music filled the air as now awake ponies cheered and rushed to the center of town to praise the return of both their princesses. Once word had gotten around that she was the one that had woken them up from their eternal slumber, the ponies of Ponyville were more than happy to welcome Celestia's long lost sister as their honored guest for the remainder of the celebration. A pair of pegasi hung a necklace of flowers around Luna's neck as she approached. But what really touched her was when they, along with the rest of the crowd, bowed for her as well for Celestia.
Twilight watched from the side of the royal chariot as she observed the conclusion of her quest in it's entirety. Lyra and Bon Bon were there in the crowd, hugging each other so hard with all fours it almost looked like they were going to melt into each other. Minuette was bouncing all over the place with her Ponyville pals, her enthusiasm outdone only by the pink poofy one who kept leapfrogging over her.
Twinkleshine was encircled by at least every foal in town as she shared party favors. One foal in particular, a thin legged and somewhat lanky pegasus presented a bow wrapped box to her. She unwrapped the gift to find a brand new camera, flash bulb and film included, and she squeezed the colt tightly before taking the camera's maiden selfie with him. Lemon Hearts stood by Nectar, undisguised, reintroducing her to the group of ponies in front of them. They all responded with hoofshakes, hugs, and white smiles, while the changeling had the biggest one of them all.
As for Moondancer-
"Twilight!"
Twilight turned around to see her number one assistant, his sleep broken as well, riding on Moondancer's back as she came from the library. He soon hopped off and ran right to her, hugging her tightly.
As Twilight finished her heartfelt reunion with the baby dragon, Moondancer saddled up right next to her. "So, Twilight. What now?"
"Well, I know this is only the start," Twilight said, still looking off into the crowd. "Princess Celestia's going to need to make a public address once she and Princess Luna are back in the palace. Plus, there'll be several royal cabinet meetings, arrangements with foreign ambassadors..."
"I mean for us," Moondancer clarified. "It all just feels so surreal putting it into perspective. We stop a world deprived of its sun, shatter its perspective by bring back another Princess, and now...we just go back to the university, and resume studying like nothing happened over break?"
"Oh, one thing is for sure," Twilight stated with certainty. "I am not just going back to my tower and reading those 'dusty old books' all the time! Princess Celestia is going to do right by her friend this time, and so am I. I'm going to be doing a lot more with you all from now on, no more skipping out on parties and such! I just hope the Princess is okay with me not having as much time for her studies anymore."
"I wouldn't be too concerned about that."
Twilight turned meet Celestia, who approached with the rest of the Canterlot unicorns in tow. "In fact Twilight, I think you'll need the time off, as you and your friends will likely be busier than ever. And that is because I have another special assignment that involves all six of you."
Twilight stiffened. "Oh no! Princess! Don't tell me there's a third sister out there! O-o-or is there some kind of cataclysmic anti-Elements that have awakened along with ours! Or...or is there some kind of huge war that's about to break out because the other nations felt threatened by the eternal night that came from Equestria?! Or-"
Celestia could not help it. She laughed, full belly and loudly. After all the emotional flooding that had happened between her and her sister in that one night, she just could not keep her composure in front of her amusing student this one time. Having fully grabbed Twilight's attention with that outburst, she regained herself and announced concordantly.
"No, my dear student. It's nothing like that. You see, Elements of Harmony awakened for you because they reacted to a certain kind of magic, a magic that, though practiced often by many, eludes understanding to all but few. Now that they are active again, I believe it would be in the best interest for ponies and all other beings that the magic that powers them be looked into further. Thusly, I, Princess Celestia, hereby decree that the unicorn Twilight Sparkle shall take on a new mission for Equestria. She must continue to study the magic of friendship and report to me her findings."
She then looked to the other unicorns, a sly grin on her face. "And what good would studying the magic of friendship be if you didn't have friends to do it with?"
They all grouped around Twilight, chattering and cheering excitedly as it sunk into Twilight what Celestia was saying.
"Oh thank you, Princess Celestia! I'll study harder than ever before."
"Isn't this exciting? Are you excited cause I'm excited I've never been so excited, well, except for the time that I went *GAAAAAASP* but I mean really-"
"Pinkie Pie? Who are you talking to?"
"Oh, hey Minuette! The story's pretty much over, so I'm just doing my iconic ending speech that comes in at the end of the first season opener. Which is probably going be the last major thing I do in a while since I'm not a main character in this spinoff!"
"Um, okay. I'm not sure I understood even half of what you said. But it seems to make you happy, so go for it! Anyways, I gotta get back to Canterlot now. Twilight's planning on doing something with me next Saturday. See ya!"
"Bye Minnie! Looking forward to that new episode! So anyways, where was I? Oh yeah, I was just saying how excited I was because-"